Ok, so why Addo Elephant National Park deserves a separate post?
- Well, Addo elephant park is a beautiful biodiversity hotspot in South Africa and habitat to over 600 elephants.
- Since you are in own vehicle you can move at your own pace.
- It was a unique experience for us since we had never done a self-drive safari in our lives before Addo national park. For a list of our other unique experiences in South Africa read, Top 6 must do things on Garden Route, South Africa.
- Also, we had a great time searching for animals on our first South Africa safari and looking at them in awe.
- More than the elephants we were overwhelmed when we saw so many zebras in real for the first time.
Here are few tips and tricks that would help anyone who is planning a self-drive South Africa safari at Addo Elephant National Park.
1. Don’t forget binoculars
Don’t forget to carry a pair of binoculars for the self-drive South Africa safari. You will spot many animals at some distance and if you want to see them up and close you do need binoculars. We almost went without one and can’t thank our apartment host enough to lend us his binoculars for the day trip to Addo National Park.
2. Carry enough water and refreshments
Make sure you are carrying enough water and refreshments for the day. At Addo you can only buy food and water at the main camp located at the north entrance gate. Also, the restaurant there is way too expensive for what they serve. The Addo elephant park is huge and you would end up wasting a lot of time and money if you keep going to the camps for basic things like food and water. It gets really hot so do carry enough water.
3. Toilets at Addo
Again amenities like toilets are only available at the entrance gates and barbecue area. So when you are buying your entrance pass for Addo National Park do use the facilities. You’ll not have access to another washroom for the next few hours.
4. Hire a Hop-on Guide
There is an option to hire a Hop-on Guide for your self-drive South Africa safari. The guide would assist you in spotting animals and guide you through the best routes in the park. The Hop-on Guides at Addo National Park are affordable and need to be pre-booked.
5. Day trip from Port Elizabeth
If you are doing a day trip to Addo Elephant National Park from Port Elizabeth then to enter the park use the Mathyolweni Gate. It is the southern access gate to the park (at the town of Colchester). This entrance is closer to Port Elizabeth (around 40-45 kilometres). You can buy your entry ticket for self-drive South Africa safari and use the washroom here but other amenities like a restaurant, petrol station etc. are only available at the main camp situated at the northern entry gate.
6. Crowd at Addo National Park
The Addo elephant park is not that crowded. If you want even lesser people then avoid going for the safari on the weekends.
7. Barbecue at Addo National Park
There is an option to do a barbecue inside Addo Elephant National Park at Jacks Picnic area. It’s a fenced picnic area and also has toilets, shaded picnic benches and chairs. If you plan to do a barbecue then do carry your meat and bread as there is no shop inside Addo to buy stuff.
8. Animal encounter at Addo National Park
We had read that the elephants in Addo are gentle and are used to cars around them so they don’t pose much threat. This is mostly true but you still need to be careful.
One incident which scared us was when a fully grown elephant (it looked really angry) came running towards our car. We were easily parked 200 metres away from it. It even touched our car with its trunk. This was one of the closest encounters we had with an elephant during our South Africa safari and it was a totally scary and thrilling experience.
(FYI, we slowly moved our car back by just a few metres and the giant mammal entered the jungle. We are assuming we had happened to stop our car at the exact same spot as the elephants’ entry point into the wilderness).
9. Elephant spotting around watering holes
One obvious tip is that there is a higher chance of spotting herds of elephants around the watering holes. If you happen to spot a family of elephants together then focus on the baby elephant, they are the cutest thing ever.
10. Stay focused to spot animals
The safari might get a little boring after the initial excitement of spotting animals. But don’t give up as its a natural habitat. There is no guarantee that you will spot wildlife the way you imagined.
Two of our most exciting animal encounters at Addo happened only in the last one hour of the safari.
11. Morning and night game drives at Addo
Addo was part of our last leg of South Africa Garden Route itinerary. We were short on time but if you are into animals then the guided morning and night game drives at Addo National Park are supposedly worth an experience. Not only you will get to experience the park when its quite but you also have a higher chance of spotting the Big 5 at Addo. If you plan to go for a night safari then it’s recommended that you book accommodation close to Addo National Park.
12. Phone network at Addo
You will get no phone signal inside the park.
