Gonarezhou Trip Report - April 2019

**Tedx2** · 2020/08/05, 02:38 PM

Greetings all. In April 2019 our elder daughter, Mel, son-in-law, Ben and granddaughter, Abby, all from Australia joined us at Gonarezhou for a fun-filled trip. Please feel free to join us on our journey. I have completed the trip report on the attached .pdf file, we have been inspired by many others that share their knowledge and experiences on this forum. We acknowledge that a number of the photographs used in our report were taken by Ben for which we thank him. We hope you enjoy the trip. Many thanks John and Linda.

**out of africa** · 2020/08/05, 02:55 PM

thanks for the report, some great photo's

**River Rat** · 2020/08/05, 02:58 PM

Thanks for the report, we visited in August 2019 so it's great to see the green vegetation. Is the photograph on page 21 Bhenji Weir?

**Frans 90** · 2020/08/05, 03:25 PM

John, you do keep the fires burning. This has been on the bucket list forever, maybe someday it may turn into a reality. Thanks for the report.

**Tedx2** · 2020/08/05, 03:27 PM

Originally Posted by out of africa

thanks for the report, some great photo's

That is a pleasure Bruce, pleased you enjoyed the journey.

**Tedx2** · 2020/08/05, 03:32 PM

Originally Posted by River Rat

Thanks for the report, we visited in August 2019 so it's great to see the green vegetation. Is the photograph on page 21 Bhenji Weir?

Hey RR, that is a pleasure, as I said in my report, one of our all time favourites. The photo on page 21 is the causeway/ dam wall of Masasanya, our camp was on the shores of this dam. This is a magnet for game in the dryer months, there are plenty of hippo and the biggest crocodile I have ever seen, we tried to measure where he was lying (after he went into the water). We thought about 16 feet!!

**Tedx2** · 2020/08/05, 03:38 PM

Originally Posted by Frans 90

John, you do keep the fires burning. This has been on the bucket list forever, maybe someday it may turn into a reality. Thanks for the report.

Hey Frans, thanks for the comment. Please do yourselves a favour and get yourselves to Gona once things normalise, you won't regret it, just be careful of elephant there, the breeding herds are very cheeky. If we are back in Africa and if you need any assistance/advise please get in touch I will do my best to help. I'm not certain if you saw our Mana/Tafika Report posted earlier this week, it was one of the best short trips we ever did, I'm sure you will enjoy it, the link is in my signature below.

**River Rat** · 2020/08/05, 04:10 PM

Originally Posted by Tedx2

Hey RR, that is a pleasure, as I said in my report, one of our all time favourites. The photo on page 21 is the causeway/ dam wall of Masasanya, our camp was on the shores of this dam. This is a magnet for game in the dryer months, there are plenty of hippo and the biggest crocodile I have ever seen, we tried to measure where he was lying (after he went into the water). We thought about 16 feet!!

Awesome, I was a bit confused because Bhenji was absolutely dry when we were there. But now we have Masasanya on the list for the next trip, cool.

To your point on breeding herds we had an encounter with a similarly irate matriarch but arguably this encounter was more frightening. We were camping at Directors and we were watching the bulls saunter down to the river in their usual pods of three, a dominant bull with his two askaris. We watched this lone bull with a broken tusk test the others only to be put in his place by the larger bulls. My son who guides part time still commented that it's always the elllie with the broken tusk that's prone to bad behavior. The bull left the river bed and was soon out of sight and the next thing he was grazing on our side of the bank at first quite peacefully and suddenly totally unprovoked he charged at us, fortunately there was a deep donga between us and we just watched the show. Needless to say we developed respect and caution for the rest of our stay.

Dam the lockdown has gotta come to an end I need the bush

.

**Tedx2** · 2020/08/06, 05:39 AM

Originally Posted by River Rat

Awesome, I was a bit confused because Bhenji was absolutely dry when we were there. But now we have Masasanya on the list for the next trip, cool.

To your point on breeding herds we had an encounter with a similarly irate matriarch but arguably this encounter was more frightening. We were camping at Directors and we were watching the bulls saunter down to the river in their usual pods of three, a dominant bull with his two askaris. We watched this lone bull with a broken tusk test the others only to be put in his place by the larger bulls. My son who guides part time still commented that it's always the elllie with the broken tusk that's prone to bad behavior. The bull left the river bed and was soon out of sight and the next thing he was grazing on our side of the bank at first quite peacefully and suddenly totally unprovoked he charged at us, fortunately there was a deep donga between us and we just watched the show. Needless to say we developed respect and caution for the rest of our stay.

Dam the lockdown has gotta come to an end I need the bush

.

Hi again RR, I've included a couple of photos of Bhenji taken in May 2016 including the well-known "loo with a view", one of these give an idea of how it looks with water in.

You are absolutely correct re breeding herds of elephant in Gonarezhou. In 2017 we had a bad experience east of Chilojo. It was about 4.00pm and many herds were going down to drink. A herd had passed by us when a 2 large cows turned around and started running towards us, I quickly moved 500m further along the road to get away from them only to run into a 2nd breeding herd that started running down the road towards us, I started reversing and the original elephant were still coming our way. I had to do some "bundu bashing" off the road to get around the elephant, it was pretty frightening. I'm not certain what I would have done if we had a trailer/caravan behind us. We don't travel that road in late afternoon any longer.

We too need the African bush