Come to the Kruger National Park!
Oh, what a glorious family holiday this was. Driving, camping, wildlife, big five, from sunrise to sunset and everything in between. Ending off each day around the campfire. Kruger National Park is a premier safari destination primarily known for its exceptional wildlife viewing opportunities and diverse landscapes. Visitors can experience the “Big Five” (lion, leopard, elephant, rhino, and buffalo) and many other species in their natural habitat. The park also offers various safari activities, from self-drives to guided game drives and bush walks, catering to different preferences and fitness levels.
Gates from top to bottom
Want to start at the top and work your way down to the bottom? Or escape the madding crowd in the south and head for the vast expanse and pure bliss in the north? Either way, here are the gates in the Kruger National Park from top to bottom. We chose Numbi gate in and out. Closest to Witrivier. Apparently, there were some issues with that gate before. German tourist shot. Others were hijacked. Too many speed bumps. Some were removed. Better now. All looked and felt fine when we went through.
- Pafuri gate
- Punda Maria gate
- Phalaborwa gate
- Orpen gate
- Paul Kruger gate
- Phabeni gate
- Numbi gate
- Malelane gate
- Krokodilbrug gate
Camps from top to bottom
Can you name all the camps from top to bottom? Here are the main camps in the Kruger National Park from northernmost to southernmost. There are also smaller and satellite camps and offsite and luxury camps and lodges and concessions. See the whole lot on sanparks.org/parks/kruger.
- Pafuri camp
- Punda Maria camp
- Shingwedzi camp
- Mopani camp
- Letaba camp
- Olifants camp
- Satara camp
- Orpen camp
- Skukuza camp
- Lower Sabie camp
- Pretoriuskop camp
- Bergendal camp
- Krokodilbrug camp
Size of the park
How many countries are smaller than the Kruger Park?
Minime wanted to know which countries are smaller than the Kruger National Park. So here we go. First, how large is the Kruger Park? It is 350kms tall and 60kms wide, total 20,000kms^2. And if you ranked the 234 countries in the world by size as on largest-countries-in-the-world/ then you find almost 80 countries and islands smaller than the Kruger National Park. The Kruger park is about the size of Slovenia, so anything smaller than that. Including Montenegro, Qatar, Lebanon, somoa, Luxemburg, Mauritius, Tonga, Singapore etc.
Animals: how many of each?
How many of each type of animal are there in the Kruger National Park?
We saw by far the most impala, those poor guys must have an identity crisis because no-one seems to stop and look twice. And by the same token there are many elephants in the south, and I wondered how many would be too many? According to animal-numbers-in-the-kruger-national-park/ these are the latest numbers of each animal in the Kruger Park, rounded. Pity we couldn’t spot wild dogs during our 5/6 days in the park.
- Impala – 180,000
- Buffalo – 40,000
- Zebra – 30,000
- Elephant – 13,000
- Blue Wildebeest – 12,000
- Giraffe – 8,000
- Kudu – 7,000
- Warthog – 6,000
- Waterbuck – 3,000
- Hyaena – 3,000
- Leopard – 2,000
- Lion – 1,600
- Hippo – 1,000
- Ostrich – 500
- Wild Dog – 300
- Cheetah – 150
And more antelope
- Nyala – 1,000
- Klipspringer – 600
- Tsessebe – 250
- Reedbuck – 200
- Eland – 170
- Sable – 150
- Hartebeest – 40
Day visitors
After our 5 nights in the park we also stayed at Marloth Park on the opposite bank of the Krokodilrivier for 3 days. Whe wanted to pop into the park one afternoon for a quick drive, but they were already full for the day. And I booked online to enter the next day so that we can drive from Krokodilbrug through the park to exit at Numbi gate, which is closest to Witrivier, as opposed to driving outside the park on the N4 via Nelspruit.
But it seems they only take 240x day visitors on pre-bookings through each gate, and so we went very early the next morning. The gates open at 6am. We were there at 05.30. And they formed 3 lines of cars. Fast-track for game drives etc. Middle lane for pre-bookings like us. And a third line for hopefuls, which may get turned away or must wait for a later slot. And it didn’t look like the let in more vehicles as others leave, like you have in a parking garage. Nonetheless, we waited in line for about 1hr (with the pre-booking) and finally got in. And it was so worth it — way better than driving around the park on the outside!
Send your bicycle to the Kruger National Park
I didn’t take my bicycle. Because this was a family holiday. But you can certainly take yours. And we will send it there. Directly to or from your accommodation around the park. Or to one of the 10+ bicycle shops around the Kruger National Park.
Let’s go!
