Limpopo Province, South Africa. 2011 - 2012 - Marakele National Park

Marakele National Park is situated in the Waterberg Mountains to the north-east of Johannesburg and is run by SAN Parks.

The approach road to Marakele.

We were delighted to get a lovely site at the edge of the camp overlooking the waterhole. Another bonus was that the campsite wasn't fenced so animals could (and did) wander around. We spent 5 nights here and could easily have stayed longer.

Bontle campsite location: S24 31.274 E27 29.574

Each pitch had power, water & bin. The ablutions were well maintained.

Cost: R170 per night (excluding Park fees).

.We were glad of the awning to give us some extra shade.

There were nearly always animals around the waterhole. In this photo there are impala, nyala, zebra, rhino and warthog.

There were always ostriches around the campsite and every evening a group of impala wandered onto the grassy area and stayed the night there.

We saw white rhino every day and sometimes they ambled onto the campsite. Everyone kept quiet and calm so they were quite happy grazing there.

On our last evening a group of rhino, including a calf, spent an hour or so grazing the short campsite grass.

We drove out to the lookout point and had some stunning views on the way to the top.

We saw several klipspringers including the one in the photos below which stayed put while we drove right up to it.

There was only one baby ostrich with dad. We never saw any predators at the Park but there must be leopards and jackal who would take young ostriches.

1. Chelmsford Nature Reserve, KwaZulu-Natal

2. Marakele National Park, Limpopo

3. Mapungubwe National Park, Limpopo

4. Punda Maria, Kruger National Park, Limpopo

Diary (word document)

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