For people who like to spice up their vacations with a bit of adventure, South Africa is the ideal destination. Here, you will find a wide range of exciting outdoor pursuits to choose from, no matter what the time of year. Whether you want to go canoeing on the Orange River, hunting exotic plants in the forests of KwaZulu-Natal, bungee jumping on the Garden Route, or mountaineering in the Drakensberg, South Africa will have something for you.

Hiking South Africa

There are about 250 hiking clubs around South Africa. Any one of them can arrange hiking tours for a day, a weekend, or longer. There are trails for beginners, and more challenging trails for veteran hikers who really like to rough it. Hiking organizations provide maps and equipment. Many of the tours provide overnight accommodation in rustic huts that have firewood, mattresses, and cold water plumbing. There are privately operated trails, as well as trails in national parks. Kruger National Park has seven. Some of the most popular trails, such as the Otter Trail, the Tsitsikamma Trail, and the Bushman Trail, are booked up to a year in advance, so be sure to make your arrangements well in advance. If you’re a dedicated hiker, you will also enjoy a uniquely South African activity called kloofing. This involves following the course of a river by wading and hopping from boulder to boulder. You have to be in good shape for this one. Read the rest of this entry »

Chances are you originally decided that you wanted to be a vet because of a love of animals, but after a while even the cutest kitten can get a little boring. Treating ‘big’ animals in England usually means administering medication to dairy cows or picking the hooves of horses, which is a world away from the ‘big’ animals that vets in South Africa regularly treat. Some vets in South Africa work entirely on game reserves, which means that they get to treat all manner of exotic animals, from lions with tooth infections to zebras with sprained ankles and even giant African elephants. All of this makes that story about the angry rottweiler you once treated seem pale and exaggerated in comparison.

However, whilst you can’t change the flora and fauna of your native country you can do something about it and take a break from the norm and attend an animal care course shadowing vets in South Africa. This animal care training will also help to fulfil a portion of your Extra Mural Study requirements, which are needed to complete your degree in veterinary science. The animal care course is typically 16 days long and will be undertaken at any number of the following African game reserves: Shamwari, Amakhala, Addo and Bayworld.

All of the game reserves are located fairly close to each other and all have different specialisations. Whilst Addo is primarily a national park for the protected African elephant, Bayworld, located in nearby Port Elizabeth, is an oceanarium, where volunteers undergoing animal care training in South Africa will be asked to perform weekly check-ups of the dolphins and seals. Read the rest of this entry »