We awoke early this morning, aware that we had a 3 and a half hour drive to Kariega and also wanting to get there in time for the afternoon game drive. We left Plettenberg Bay just before 9am and had a fairly seamless journey down Route 2 toward Port Elizabeth (now known as Gqeberha). PE is a very industrial city and frankly not pleasant to look at as you drive through, although apparently they have made great strides in recent years to improve things.
Shortly after PE we took the R72 towards Kenton-on-Sea and 40 minutes later arrived at Kariega Game Reserve, a journey just touching 4 hours in total. After passing through several sets of serious looking gates, we drove down another 4km of dirt track. On route we saw springboks, impalas and giraffes in the distance before we were met by a lovely porter who informed us we would be arriving at Settlers Drift by river boat!! He showed us down to the jetty where we said goodbye to the car for 4 days, he then packed all of our luggage into his jeep and served us drinks while we waited for the boat to arrive.
When it arrived, we met Michael, who will also be our safari guide for the duration of our stay, and off we set for Settlers Drift. With incredible scenery all around, we made our way up the Bushman’s river for about 20 minutes before getting onto a safari jeep for the last few minutes up to Settlers Drift. We were greeted with warm towels and a welcome drink and shown around our accommodation which is just beautiful. We are currently the only ones here but are expecting another couple later today.
After a light lunch we then headed straight out for our first game drive which was quite something. We saw a whole host of animals but the highlights were the many giraffes and a white rhino. We also saw a herd of over 30 elephants the other side of the river, which hopefully we will see more closely tomorrow.
Michael drove to a lovely viewpoint as the sun went down and served us drinks and snacks from the Truck which was quite amazing.
We were again greeted back into Settlers Drift on our return at 7pm with hot towels and another drink and after we freshened up we ate a fabulous meal in the wine cellar before returning to our tents for an early night ahead of the 5.30am wake up call for our dawn game drive tomorrow!
The Perry’s Travel Blog 