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Popular Off the Beaten Path | Other Off the Beaten Path Tips | All Tips (270) Long, long ago at the beginning of time when the earth was still young, many of the animals looked very different to how we know them today. The zebra was as white as the snow on top of the mountains and the baboon was covered in fur from his head to his tail. The shining white zebra stallion was extremely vain and would admire his reflection in a pool of water. "How beautiful I am," he would say shaking his head and flicking his tail.
One day the zebra stallion saw the ugly baboon across the banks of the Umfoloze river. "See how beautiful I am you ugly baboon!" he cried, his voice echoing off the hills. The baboon tossed his head in anger and with rolling eyes barked back, "You silly zebra, you may be more beautiful, but I am stronger!"
The baboon challenged the zebra to a fight.
The very next night, by the light of a huge fire, the whole Zulu tribe came out to watch the zebra and the baboon in battle. The baboon edged the zebra closer and closer to the fire. He was a sly creature and had secretly surrounded the fire with a ring of stones. As the zebra came nearer to the flames he tripped on the stones and fell on his back onto the sticks of the fire. He screamed in agony as the burning sticks branded his pure white hide with black stripes. Jumping up in rage and pain he kicked the baboon so hard that all the hair fell off his backside.
And that is why today the zebra has stripes and the baboon has a backside bald and pink. Leave a Comment
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The warthog built himself a house out of an old ant termite hill. He hollowed out the inside and made a wide, grand entrance on one side so that all the animals would be able to see his beautiful house. He stood proudly outside as the giraffe and the antelope walked past, "See my fine house," he would say, "nobody has a house as fine as mine."
One day Bhubesi the lion came prowling by. Warthog suddenly realized that because of his vanity he had made the entrance to his house so large that the lion would be able to enter. The lion chased him into his house. "AAAiiiiish!" said the warthog to himself, "What shall I do now?" He decided to copy the trick used by the wily jackal. He got down on his knees and thrust his rear end up to the roof. "Be careful Bhubesi" he shouted, "the roof is falling down, run before it comes down on your head!" The lion shook his head and the lion is no fool. The jackal had tried that particular trick on him before. Luckily for warthog, lion wasn’t hungry, but before letting warthog go, he made him promise to walk about on his knees as a sign of respect.
The warthog is a slow witted animal, and that is why, until this day, you will see the warthog as he grazes on the sweet grass, down on his knees with his rear end in the air. Leave a Comment
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At the southern end of the Drakensberg range are the great sandstone cliffs known as Xalanga ('the place of vultures').
Beneath these cliffs lies the small town of Indwe, named from the Xhosa word for the blue crane, the bird emblem of South Africa.
The town was founded in 1896 as a coal- mining centre,but the mine is no longer worked. Leave a Comment
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Durban's Golden Mile stretches from Addington in the South, to blue Lagoon in the North and is comprised of a collection of sun drenched beaches , fun fairs, piers and pavement vendors selling all kinds of African art from sculpted works of wood and stone to paintings of traditional African scenes.
The beachfront attracts by far the greatest number of visitors to Durban, who mostly come to soak up the warm sub tropical climate, or laze on the beach baking in the sun's rays.
Durban is also known for its surfing on the well shaped waves and warm ocean waters of the Agulhas current.
A definite must is to catch a rickshaw ride along the beachfront with one of the friendly locals clad in traditional gear.
For a great view of the high - rise hotels and apartment buildings head for one of the many piers extending seawards. Leave a Comment
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Hyenas live in small packs, with a female usually being the leader. The groups are rarely bigger than ten animals. They demarcate their territory with urine and faeces and chase members of other packs away. Spotted hyenas are night animals. They spend most of the day in earth holes. The young ones stay in these caves for a long time. They are fed until the age of one year and only start eating meat when they first - at about nine months of age - go hunting with the grown-ups. Leave a Comment
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One comes across baboons in many parts of southern Africa. They are not confined to game reserves and prefer rocky mountain areas. They are characterized by red callosities at the bottom and the typical position of the tail, the first third of which is held straight upwards, while the rest is hanging down. Baboons live in hordes of 20 to 100 animals in a strict hierarchy with one leading male and a few subordinate males. They are omnivorous and mainly live on insects, mice, lizards, berries and wild fruit. Leave a Comment
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"Shoot straight, you b******s" were the last words of Harry "The Breaker" Morant - crack horseman, poet, hero (or rogue - depending on your point of view), as he and fellow lieutenant, Peter Handcock, soldiers in the Bushveldt Carbineers ( a mainly Australian force raised in South Africa), faced a British firing squad on 27 February, 1902, in the dying days of the Boer War. They stood convicted of executing a Boer found wearing the clothes of their murdered and mutilated friend, Carbineer Captain Hunt , and some other Boer prisoners. A German missionary was also killed after Morant had suspicions about his motives in speaking with Boer prisoners, though on this charge they were found "Not guilty".
The death warrant had been signed by Lord Kitchener himself, and when he later revealed, in writing, that he had issued orders to kill Boers wearing English uniforms, and furthermore that the court martial was conducted hurriedly and in secret, contrary to regulations, and the transcripts were "lost", reaction in Australia was such that changes to military law were brought in and since their execution no Australian has been tried on a capital charge by a British Army Court..
Morant and Handcock were buried together in a joint grave, initially near where they were shot in Pietersberg. The grave was later moved to Heroes Acre in Pretoria where, 100 years after the execution, a small ceremony saw the placing of a plaque, a final recognition of the two who many believe were sent to their death as scapegoats for what had become an unpopular and untenable war. Take a few minutes to find the grave and spend a moment in reflection on the ways of war, the young men who fight and the old men who send them to their fate. Leave a Comment
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Considerable variation exists throughout the range of the Nile crocodile. Generally, it is a large crocodilian, averaging 5 m in length but reportedly reaching 6 m in rare instances. There are dubious reports of 7 m animals having existed, but these are hard to verify. There is some evidence that Nile crocodiles in cooler countries (eg. South Africa) reach slightly smaller adult sizes (4 m). There are two known population of dwarf Nile crocodiles living on the extreme limits of the species' range, in Mali and even the Sahara Desert! Due to suboptimal conditions, adults average between 2 and 3 metres. Juveniles are dark olive brown with black cross-banding on the tail and body. This banding becomes fainter in adults. Leave a Comment
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To view the wildlife without paying an arm and a leg I would rent a car. We self drove oursleves throughout the many National parks. Alot of the time we would pass the land rovers on their safaris, so we were obviously doing the same trails as alot of the paying safaris. Sometimes our little 2 wheel drive Toyota could not get over the log in the road but all in all, we were lucky as we were not doing this in the wet season which would have made it impossible in our car. Leave a Comment
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A tour of the Cango Caves is a must if you are in the area. The tour is a guided one and is most interesting. The stalagmites and stalactites have formed amazing configurations over the years. Our guide was very knowledgeable. The tour took about an hour and was well worth it. Leave a Comment
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on February 17, 2005
on November 16, 2005
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on May 31, 2005
