Don & Kully's World Cruise on Viking Neptune

For the past two days we’ve had pretty nasty weather with rain and gusty winds. This morning looked like it would be the same and that we might not be able to dock in Port Elizabeth, but we were able to find our way into the port approximately 90 minutes later than planned. With in an hour of our arrival the sun was out and we had a beautiful first day on shore in South Africa.

Port Elizabeth is actually the old colonial name of the city. In 2021 the name of the city was changed to the Xhosa and Southern Khoe name of Gqeberha. Along with the surrounding towns and townships, Gqeberha forms part of Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality. Its urban coastline is dotted with picturesque, blue flag beaches which are popular hotspots for locals and visitors alike. Additionally, the city serves as a gateway to the Eastern Cape’s wildlife and great outdoors, including safari adventures to witness the “Big 5” game species.

Since we had originally booked our own overland tour from Richards Bay (the port call that was cancelled two days ago) we hadn’t made any plans for a tour from here. Fortunately, we were able to get last minute tickets for a day safari at the Schotia Wildlife Preserve through Viking. Schotia is the oldest private game reserve in the eastern cape of South Africa with over 40 mammal species and over 2000 total animals in the park. The reserve contains free roaming lions, giraffes, zebras, hippopotamus, rhinoceros, multiple deer and antelope species, including the rare black impala, water buffalos, elephants, warthogs, blue wildebeest, jackals, oryx, crocodiles and multiple bird species. I was a little pessimistic about doing a “mid-day” safari, didn’t expect to see much, but we saw everything the park advertised including the lions.

Enough words, here are pictures of what we saw today.

All in all, a pretty amazing day of wildlife viewing! Definitely recommend the Schotia Wildlife Preserve if you only have a short period of time and want to see as many different species as possible.

Out next port of call is on Wednesday in Cape Town, South Africa.