Weekend in Finfoot Reserve, South Africa

South Africa continues to amaze me all the time!! After spending two months in the country and travelling quite a bit, I thought that I had covered most of the interesting spots around. And then I discover that there are so many other amazing experiences available so close to Johannesburg which I did not even know of - one of them being the private game reserves.

One of the weekends this year, I spent in the Finfoot Lake Reserve which is quite close to Joburg. It is a relatively new resort that has opened recently. It is a typical private game reserve which has an accommodation option located in a huge open and green area. And the owners buy different kinds of animals and keep them within their property for the enjoyment of the residents and visitors. After the visit to Finfoot, I also realised that there were many more such reserves very near Johannesburg which I had never been aware of till now.

Finfoot is about a 1.5-2 hours drive from Joburg, on the way to Sun City. While driving there, we passed through the city of Pretoria. And though I have still not managed to visit Pretoria properly yet, we did end up driving through some of the central parts of town. We saw lots of grand colonial buildings in the central area but nothing out of the ordinary. We also drove past a couple of huge buildings while felt empty and falling apart. It was quite an interesting sight to see multiple storeyed buildings completely empty and run-down - this isn't something I have ever seen before. Some parts of Pretoria felt quite unsafe too but that may just be my perception.

The rest of the drive to Finfoot was through highways, so pretty uninteresting in terms of sights you see. I got excited towards the end when I saw people selling fresh and juicy local mangoes on the road but sadly I did not get out to buy them😡. (I think we all tend to over-stress on all the unsafe aspects of this country, ending up sometimes stopping ourselves from enjoying it fully. And I am as guilty of that as anyone else).

Vaalkop dam at night

Finfoot reserve is located within the Elands river game reserve near the Vaalkop dam in Rustenburg. It has about 3500 hectares of land and encloses a lake within its area. Coming from Joburg, the last stretch inside the game reserve needed us to drive on a long winded and muddy drive till we reached the resort. This road looked totally red due to the colour of the mud here. It was a bit dangerous to drive too because the rain from the previous night had created lot of small puddles, but otherwise I would not expect this road to be a problem. Also, by this time we had already started spotting some wildlife - a huge iguana was lazily crossing the road in front of us. So the drive was still fun😊.

Mother and baby giraffe

The animals inside the reserve were all mostly vegetarian and hence not dangerous to people. So it was ok to get out of the car while trying to observe them (unlike Kruger park). As soon as we entered the reserve while driving towards the resort, we started seeing various animals - a huge iguana slinking into the grass, a herd of ostriches running very fast, brown zebras (which I had seen for the first time in my life), a mother and a one week old baby giraffe, impalas, loads of gnus, kudus and so on. As there were already two activities which were included in the cost of the stay, we spotted the animals while driving towards the resort but then just stayed in the resort for the whole afternoon.

Finfoot reserve

Once at the resort, it was like a very different vibe, like a 'jungle main mangal' feeling. The whole resort was a cluster of basic thatched roof huts with a pool and eating area - everything you need to have a lazy time. There were also some bigger villas next to the lake for bigger parties of tourists, but the main area felt quite small and cosy. All around it was just the forest and nothing else. It was quite hot in the afternoon, so we just relaxed around. It already felt like living in the wild. When I was sleeping in my hut, I could hear the constant chirping of birds outside, to the point of being unable to sleep because of it!! And later I saw a waterbuck walk by the watering hole near the pool to drink water, everything was already feeling unreal by that time:).

Birds on the island in the lake

The first activity for the day was a boat ride in the lake nearby. It was a 2 hour activity, where we drove to the lake and took the resorts' boats to lazily float around the lake observing the birds and animals on both sides. There are two rivers which flow into the lake and there is a dam on the other side making sure there is always enough water in the dam. We spotted a lot of animals and birds on the bank and the island in between, while observing the sunset along the lake.

Snakebird

While boating around the central island, we saw and heard loads of birds - Fish eagle and Goliath eagle being the major ones amongst them. The only other bird which I can recall is the snakebird (or the African darter), which we saw in action too. It swoops into the water to catch its prey. And then swims in such a way that only the neck is above the water giving it the look of a snake moving with its head out of the water!

On the banks of the lake, we observed many herds of zebras near the owners' villa, as well as nyalas and red hartebeests grazing lazily. Apparently, there used to be buffaloes and rhinos in the area too earlier, but they have all been poached by now :(. And there were some hippos and crocodiles in the river too, but we did not get to see them either. Our ranger and boat guide were a chatty bunch, so it was fun to learn from them more about the area and how a private game reserve operates. And the whole atmosphere was so relaxing, that it did not feel that we weren't doing much at all😀.

Finfoot reserve

The day had started out quite hot, but turned a lot more pleasanter as the evening wore on. The food options for lunch and dinner at the resort were quite good, and the whole atmosphere was so relaxing... Green trees all around, warm sun above, bird and insect sounds all around, and a pool with cool water! What more can one ask for?

Running zebras

The next morning was a whole different experience. First, I went for a 30 minutes walk around (at about 7am) and ran into a group of zebras who did not like me at all 😀. They were lazily eating their breakfast (tree leaves) but ran away as soon as they saw me - it was impressive though seeing such a huge herd run away so fast like that. Then I ran into another herd which ran away even faster. Turns out people on foot are scarier than when in the car!

Once back from the walk, we went on a segway tour of the farm with the ranger as the second activity of the day. It was like racing very fast along the unkept roads of the farm, observing animals from much closer - it was so fresh and surreal. And manoeuvring the segway was a lot of fun too. I got stuck in the mud once, but still went quite fast on the tracks, almost like floating on air 😊.

Gembuck

During the sehgway tour also, we saw tons of animals - the adult mother and baby giraffe with her again, a herd of gembucks, 3-4 solitary nyalas, some herds of ostrich, impalas, zebras, blue wildebeests, baby wildebeests and so on. My favourite of them were the gembucks - they looked so cute and beautiful - and the one week old baby giraffe. We had run into a herd of gembucks, who ran across our paths very quickly. Then they stood waiting a long time for some of their herd members to cross our paths and come to them. While waiting, they all looked so majestic! I wish I had been able to get a better picture of them all standing together like that - but alas all I have are some iphone pictures which don't do justice to them at all. Towards the end, we also ran into a very small tortoise which our guide got with her to show at the resort.

Small tortoise on the trail

The whole segway ride was a two hour tour, during which we took a quick break at the lake and ate some snacks. I realised during the tour, that the animals run away when they see humans on their feet/segway but not when in the car. In fact, at one point I got off the segway and tried to follow a giraffe but he ran away faster than I could follow😁. So even though unlike the national parks, here you can get out of your car as there are no predators around, it does not help at all as they run away and don't let you observe them, even if from a safe distance:(.

The receptionist at the reserve was scared of reptiles and the team got a snake to show her - a beaked stilleto snake - which they had caught from the manager's house😀. It felt like she may not be working on the most well suited places for her if she doesn't like animals😆.

Leaving Finfoot

Anyways we had a quick breakfast at the resort and left soon enough for a safari at the Pilanesberg reserve. While leaving we saw a group of ostrich who started running and we were pleasantly surprised to see how fast they run - they were almost head to head with the car for a couple of minutes! I also saw some birdwatchers there and the big cameras they use - they are really huge (I did not know that before) While driving out of the reserve, I saw some amazing views which made my day, with bright colours all around - the red sand, green trees around and the blue sky above. The whole drive out was quite magnificent!

Rhinos showing their backs to us

Thereafter, we went to Pilanesburg Game Reserve for a quick safari, through the Manyane gate. We saw yellow tailorbirds at the gate which we had also spotted at Finfoot. Inside the park, we saw loads of animals - many rhinos, solitary wildebeests giving good poses and coming too close, lots of hippos in the water, 2 elephants standing with their backs to each other, herds of zebras, gnus and impalas roaming together and so on.

Elephants showing their backs
 to each other

We also saw baby giraffes, baby warthogs with their mum, lots of baby wildebeests and baby zebras too. It looked like it was the season of the little ones:). Unlike the last time I was there, it felt a lot more green and fresh also - a completely different view than when I went there in September last year. And so the colours all around were picture perfect- red sand, green hills, and blue and white sky.

The grass was a rich green everywhere because of the recent rains. The whole area felt very very unusually quiet too, wonder why! It was more hot now than my visit last time but still we managed to see more animals then before. Sadly again though, we spotted no cats :(. I was almost convinced there are none at Pilanesberg till a colleague showed me some pics of lions he saw next to a lake in Pilanesberg. So now I am partially convinced but still not fully😉! The roads were quite bad which I realised as we drove ourselves this time. Overall, a nice safari stop and soon it was time to back at work in Joburg. It was a nice weekend and I would recommend such lodges to everyone who enjoys a nice weekend away...

Warthog family with babies

Wildebeest with baby