A familiar favourite: Hluhluwe-Imfolozi Park in December

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Our December 2019 bush breakaway concluded at the Hluhluwe-Imfolozi Park, one of the oldest game reserves in Africa and a place that is very dear to our hearts. We spent five nights there, accommodated in Chalet #16 at wonderfully wild Mpila Camp.

Welcome to Mpila
You should take this warning seriously!
Chalet 16 at Mpila in the Hluhluwe-Imfolozi Park, December 2018

Hluhluwe-Imfolozi is looking as green and lush as we’ve ever seen it, with the rivers flowing strongly, and that is a heartening sight to behold considering that not so long ago the Park was in the grips of a terrible and prolonged drought that tested the metal of plant and animal life alike. Compare the images in the gallery below with those we took during a visit in 2015, at the height of the drought.

Waterhole at Mphafa Hide
Imfolozi Sunrise
Sunrise over the Black Umfolozi River
A wide bend in the Black Umfolozi
Marula fruit
Sickle-bush bloom
Sweet Thorn blossoms
A view over the White Umfolozi River with a herd of buffalo on the banks
View from Siwasamikhosikazi picnic site
Having fun at Hluhluwe-Imfolozi Park
View over the valley of the Nzimane River

A place as magnificent as Hluhluwe-Imfolozi is home to a countless variety of wildlife. Depicted in the following gallery is just a smidgen of the array of invertebrate life that crossed our path during our visit – we enjoyed them all of course, except those pesky mosquitoes… Regular spells of rain resulted in eruptions of termite and ant alates taking to the wing to establish new nests, providing a glut of food for a wide variety of insectivorous fauna.

Bagworm – larval stage of a moth in the family Psychidae
Black-striped Hairtail
Caterpillar on an aloe branch
Giant African Land Snail
Grasshopper of the family Pamphagidae – probably a female as they are wingless
Matabele Ants
Termite alates taking flight
Tick

The warm, wet weather and ample insect buffet meant that amphibians and reptiles were quite regularly seen, especially in the camp and at other places where you are allowed to exit your vehicle. These ranged in size and danger from frogs and geckos to monitor lizards and nile crocodiles and even a snake or two.

Foam Nest Frog nest
Eastern Olive Toad
Cape Dwarf Gecko
Giant Legless Skink
Striped Skink
Spotted Bush Snake inside our chalet at Mpila
Rock Monitor
Nile crocodiles on a sandbank in the Black Umfolozi River

Hluhluwe-Imfolozi is a bird paradise at any time of year, and even more so during the warm summer months when their numbers swell with migrants from northern latitudes. These are just a few of the over 100 species we recorded during this visit.

Black Cuckoo-shrike (female)
Black-bellied Bustard
Black-shouldered Kite
Blue Waxbill
Brown Snake Eagle
Brown-hooded Kingfisher
Burchell’s Coucal
Cape Turtle Dove
Cape White-eye
Chinspot Batis (female)
Crested Barbet
Crowned Hornbill
Dark-capped Bulbul
Egyptian Goose
Emerald-spotted Wood Dove
Familiar Chat
Golden-breasted Bunting
Grey-headed Sparrow
Hadeda Ibis nest at Mphafa hide (photo by Joubert)
Hamerkop silhouette
Hamerkop (photo by Joubert)
Helmeted Guineafowl
African Hoopoe
Lappet-faced Vulture
Lesser Spotted Eagle
Lesser Striped Swallow
Long-tailed Paradise Whydah (male in transitional plumage)
Mocking Cliff Chat
Namaqua Dove
Red-backed Shrike (juvenile)
Red-billed Oxpecker
Red-billed Quelea pair
Red-billed Teals
Red-breasted Swallow
Red-chested Cuckoo (photo by Joubert)
Red-winged Starlings raiding Village Weaver nests, presumably for nesting material
Rufous-naped Lark
Sabota Lark (photo by Joubert)
Scarlet-chested Sunbird
Secretary Bird (photo by Joubert)
Southern Masked Weaver (female)
Spotted Eagle-owl
Spotted Flycatcher
Steppe Buzzard
Steppe Buzzard (photo by Joubert)
Steppe Eagle (photo by Joubert)
Tawny Eagle (photo by Joubert)
Tawny (front) and Wahlberg’s (back) Eagles sharing a tree
Three-banded Plover
Trumpeter Hornbills
Village Weaver (male)
Violet-backed Starling (female)
Water Thick-knees at Bhejane Hide
Wattled Lapwing
White-backed Vultures near Mpila
White-browed Scrub Robin
White-crested Helmetshrike
Woolly-necked Stork
Yellow-billed Kite (photo by Joubert)
Yellow-fronted Canary
Yellow-throated Longclaw
Yellow-throated Petronia

What would an African game reserve be without charismatic big mammals? Hluhluwe-Imfolozi certainly delivers on that score, but the occasional and usually unexpected glimpses of small or lesser seen furry creatures – mice, hares, bats and the like – can be just as pleasing!

Baboon male
African buffalo
African buffalo (photo by Joubert)
Elephant herd on the move
Big elephant bull in musth
Elephant drinking at Bhejane
Giraffe bull
Grey Duiker
Proud Impala Ram
Fighting Impala Rams (photo by Joubert)
Mauritian Tomb Bats
Nyala ewe
Scrub Hare
Single-striped Grass Mouse
Spotted Hyena
Spotted Hyena
I did it my way…
Thieving Vervet Monkey with a stolen bounty (photo by Marilize)
Playful warthog piglets at Mpila (photos of Joubert)
Warthog enjoying a scratch after a mudbath
White Rhinos
White Rhino
White Rhino

Even the magnificent King of Beasts provided us a few memorable encounters, and the lions at Hluhluwe-Imfolozi definitely are as regal as any elsewhere on the continent.

Beautiful male lion
Beautiful male lion (photo by Joubert)
The King and Prime Minister of Imfolozi
Young male lion on the move
Young male lion on the move
Young male lion on the move
Young male lion on the move
Young male lion on the move

A visit to Hluhluwe-Imfolozi is just never long enough, no matter how long we stay. We exited the Park at Memorial Gate as we headed back to Pretoria to spend Christmas with our family, which of course is always a great treat, but truth be told it would have been so much nicer if the rest of the family could’ve joined us in HIP to spend Christmas in paradise…

The route from Pretoria to Memorial Gate
(drawn with Google Maps)

 

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24 thoughts on “A familiar favourite: Hluhluwe-Imfolozi Park in December”

  4. naturebackin

    What a wonderful collection of lovely photos. The bird gallery is particularly entrancing. We too were last at Imfolozi during the tragic drought. Lovely to see your photos of it now – they make us look forward even more to our visit there in a few weeks’ time.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply ↓
      1. naturebackin

        Unfortunately we don’t have long – we will be two nights at Mpila, two nights at Cape Vidal and then three nights at Ithala, staying in the small bush camp there. We are looking forward to it as we have been not away in quite a long time.

        Liked by 1 person

        Reply ↓
        1. de Wets Wild Post author

          That really is a wonderful itinerary – three of our favourite destinations as well!
          Cape Vidal and the Eastern Shores must be one of the best places in SA to see leopards – the Grassland Loop in the early morning is a must drive!
          And we went to Ithala in August 2018 and what a great time we had – even saw elephants right at the waterhole in front of Ntshondwe’s restaurant!

          Liked by 1 person

          Reply ↓
          1. naturebackin

            Thanks for the tip re the drive. We will look out extra hard for leopards. We are hoping to see the subspecies of Samango monkey that occurs there (different to the subspecies in the Midlands mistbelt forests) and perhaps see one of the “blonde” Samangos that we have see before when visiting there.
            How interesting that the elephants came up to Ntshondwe! I had the impression that they mostly hung around the Pongola river area.

            Liked by 1 person

            Reply ↓
      1. Rainsinn

        Absolutely!!! 😍😊 living between these amazing birds and animals would be heaven. I could spend an entire day just watching them, photographing them then and repeat the same thing the following day. 😊 there will always be an excitement about what am I going to see today. Wow… I really can’t think of anything better right now 😊

        Liked by 1 person

        Reply ↓
  7. JANE

    Pardon the yell…but it’s from excitement… WOW!!!
    The bird gallery alone would be cause for celebration… then add all the other flora and fauna. I have a soft spot in my heart for all these wonderful creatures and the one who super captured my eye is the brown-hooded kingfisher. (I venture to say, he was probably not easy to catch for a photo!)
    What a remarkable difference water makes. Thankful the drought has passed.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply ↓
    1. de Wets Wild Post author

      Seeing the Park during the height of the drought was really tough, Jane, so to see it now looking so vibrant again, with all the wildlife to go with it, really is a reason for celebration. Wet and Dry are natural cycles in Africa’s savannas, but with changing weather patterns making the droughts ever more frequent, prolonged and harsh there’s cause for concern.

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply ↓
      1. JANE

        You are not alone with changing weather concerns. Not to tread too deeply into the political woes of the United States… I think it’s tough having a president that doesn’t acknowledge science or believe that climate change is a true concern… Your observations and comments accentuate the reality that we are in this as a global community.

        Liked by 1 person

        Reply ↓
    1. de Wets Wild Post author

      Hluhluwe-Imfolozi Park really is one of our country’s most valuable reserves – not least because it is the place where the southern white rhinoceros was rescued from the brink of extinction!

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