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As WTM said, this belongs here. Stationed in the KNP during national service near CB we decided to take a break near LS on the river opposite the river from the tourist roads. Thinking this was the perfect oppertunity for a breakfluid tan no tanlines allowed,I stationed myseld on a rock close to some hippo's.(they cannot jump)
All went well until the guys got swimming. Next mo. I was sharing my rock with a BIG hippo.(He didn't read the book on hippo's). Being young & fit I started running away from the river........Straight into view of about a zillion tourists.
I still wonder what they thaught of this lily white man....Dangling away with great speed with hippo in tow.
A few months later a friend showed me the Tshokwane sigthings book: "Species homo sapiens running away from hippo with %^*^cencored%^#. I still have that page.

Stupid stuff

Me
1. I was not alert when Freda, with YR, waved & stopped as I drove by, not seeing her
2. Taking first timers without warning them how hardcore I am.
3. Getting to the night ride on time instead of early to get the seats you want
4. Booking Satara for 3 nights and Croc Bridge for 2 instead of the other way round.
5. Trying to video with the lens cap on

That's enough for me for one trip

My wife
1. Losing my spare set of car keys. If anyone picks up a set of keys (probably) in Satara camping area with a Cape Bakkie Centre tag on, they are mine.
2. Not accompanying me on my New year's Day 4h30 drive

Her friends
1. Buying 3 bottles of wine and only drinking 1.5 and leaving the rest in the heat
2. Braaing until after 22h00 on leadwood or ironwood
3. Not accompanying me on my New year's Day 4h30 drive

Hey. My dad blamed me for the video camera not working when the only thing that was wrong was that the lens cap was on at a leopard sighting. My brother then almost shouted to the world that the lens cap was on in front of quite a few bemused tourists(at least i think they were tourists)

Nearly drove my car off a cliff trying to get rid of a spider when it came in through my window. The spider was hanging from its silk thread and then suddenly the wind blew it right towards me and barely missing my right shoulder.
I obviously followed its trajectory with my eyes, head, shoulders, body... All the way to my legs and feet. Ended up that in my gymnastics turn trying to follow the spiders trajectory, I straightened my left foot on the accelerator and at the same time also turned the steering wheel to the right.
We raced off the road straight into the bushes and barely stopped before the cliff. Quickly reversed out of the bushes and back onto the road. Switched the car off and jumped over to the rear seat for operation 'find spider'.

I'm not really scared of spiders. I have no problem with a spider if I know its not poisonous, but when I don't know then I'm extremely careful. Have seen way to many bad spider bites when I used to work in the pharmacy. Visions of black necrotic tissue popping though my head. Not to mention the picks we've all seen on emails where people actually loose limbs.

If a spider is non-poisonous, then it's live and let live.
If it's a poisonous spider then it's a case of get away from me or die.
That's my philosophy.

As an HR, I'm quite embarrassed about my little off-road excursion, but it was seriously unavoidable

I was enjoying a peaceful braai alone at Mudzanzeni one afternoon when a noisy bunch in arrived and ruined the peace .
I was rather upset and left the demarcated area on foot and walked about 100 metres up the dry stream bed and sat down there untill the attendant came looking for me , the noisy bunch had left and the attendant had noticed my car was there but no one was visible .
A silly thing to do to in order to have peace ?

One of the most stupid thing i have done was in last February 2007 , on our last day in the park at Skukuza , just before leaving the park by Numbi gate to take the plane at 2:00 PM at KMIA for Johannesburg with a connection for Paris .
We had , me and my sons of 12th and 13th , a very very pleasant stay in the park during 13 days .
On our last day the boys were very excited and i waked up at 4:30 am as often in the park to take a shower , put the last things in the luggages etc .... and take a cup of coffee with some cakes to have enough force to drive .
Boys don't like me to take a cup of coffee as they think because of that we are always 5 minutes too late to past the gates of the restcamp.
So , for one time i had , what i was thinking ....untill ...... a very good idea : i gave the keys of the car to my younguest boy , who's i thank .....untill ....he had the head on the shoulders as we say in France .
So , while boys were putting the luggages in the boot of the car i went to the communal kitchen to bowl my water for coffee .
For one time we were very early , soon ready to past the gates and discover the area of Pretoriuskop i was waiting for ! after putting my nescafe in the cup , i went back to the bungalow ....
And there , i found why ??? my boys were laughing and could'nt spoke , near the car .
My younguest son is an" idiot ": he was thinking he was " Popey , the sailor man" and played with the door of the boot , showing his brother her biceps ....leaving the keys on the luggages .After that he naturally closed the boot ...
After a time , they says me the keys were in the boot of the car and it is not possible to open it .
First i am not too disturb ; but after a time i must realise it is not possible to open the boot ...I am angry ......Though a kindly man from the staff helped us the lockmen will arrive only at 10H45 from Hazyview open the boot for R1800 , glupps ..... for one time i think there is something very very expansive in RSA , but no time to discuss the price .
And bye bye Pretoriuskop , after a quick drive through Paul Kruger Gate we will arrive just in time in KMIA to take the plane .Hopefully i know this road as i tooked it the year before with my SO .
Waiting for the plane , we will see he is delayed , instead of 2:00 we will have it only at 19h , but it was a sort of jet , 30 mns to Johann only and after a run we will just have our connection at 20H45 for Paris . No time to buy anything at the airport .

This was a very bad day and the Ginn-fizz i had in the plane for Paris was one of the best thing i ever drunk .....

Hi all

Hold your horses to this one

I recall one hot afternoon in December 2005, we were camping in Berg-en-dal for 4 days...but didnt see much..only rhinos I was there with some fellow friends, one from overseas (his first time) and we were a bit frustrated because of bad sightings.....

I can still remeber this afternoon clearly I had this hairy gorilla mask (hey im still in the younger age group and to be honest, Im not scared of masks at all, but this one is quite good....) which was black...and I had some dark clothes on to.

Now this older fella (40 or so) and his wife had this safari truck, and I assume they were tour guides...without tourists so to speak. His wife was preparing for the night on the rooftents, and he was sitting on his camping chair next to the truck, his back against it....and probably was half sleeping half reading. I, in some naughty mood, put on the mask and stood at the corner of the truck, so that he couldnt see me! I just showed my head around the corner, but he didnt notice me......so I made this deep uuuuuuhhhh sound!!! The poor guy rocketed up, and had such a fright he started swearing and shouting, and almost gave me a fist on my face!!

All my friends were watching, and couldnt breath as the were laughing out loud!! The guy's wife couldnt stop aswell, and later on told me I should have told her what I intended doing so that she could film it It took the guy some 5 min before he could appreciate the joke and laugh with us.....but it was more like a bear smile
These are things we both will never forget.
Monné

Not sure if this is stupid or funny. Perhaps both?
In the early 1990's we were joining my parents a t satara. They were caravaning there and we were going to camp next to them for 2 nights over the weekend. We arrived and pitched our small tent (the kids were sleeping in the van with the grandparents). My dad then decided it was very hot and that he should but the beach umbrella up over the tent to keep it cool. He had one of those cork scew things you use to make a hole for the umbrella pole. It went in a couple of centimetres and then hit what my dad thought was a rock so he applied more preassure. Well he "struck"water. He had in fact pierced the water pipe to the nearby ablution block. You have never seen a tent and caravan and 2 cars being packed up so fast The water was gushing out and all our equipment was getting wet. My late Dad had a sense of humour, so, once we had moved he went of to the camp office to complain there was no water in the ablution blocks!

The thing I have done more than once is to get carried away game or bird watching and lean against the electric fence for stability. I can tell you they do work well.

I think my story fits in here, too!

Before our very first (but definitely not last) trip to KNP this Feb./Mar., we had decided to buy one of those small digital cameras that fit into every pocket, since we were also going to be in "dangerous" areas like Cape Town and Garden Route, where you are not supposed to flash big cameras. I had not bothered to read the handbook, everything seemed to be rather self-explanatory.

And it sure was - unless you get into an unexpected situation:

My partner was driving and suddenly stopped on the left side of the road, next to a big tree, without saying anything at first. I saw something dangling from a branch, thought "snake" first, "hairy snake" next and "leopard" third. Then the dangling thing started to move, my partner screamed "close the window", which I did, at the same time reaching for the camera, turning it on, focussing, pressing the button - nothing happens! No photo on the display! Darn' camera!! So I start gibbering to my partner, totally excited, waving the camera back and forth, knowing from the moving grass on the side of the road that the leopard is still there, and then I see it starting to cross the road - try to focus again, push the button ...... and turn the video off!

Anyone care to see a video of the inside of our car with my hand wildy gesticulating??
Was our only leopard, by the way, but at least we saw it with our "built-in" cameras!!

Greets
Unikate

Is this a topic or thread we can have some fun with. I figured we can all use a laugh or two.

My most embarrassing moment happend in 2003. As we were leaving JHB, there was a truck brake shoe in the middle of the highway close to the airport. Having just had a hot cup of coffee poured for me by SO, I carefully steered the car to go over the unidentified object just right of the center of the car. We got airborne and coffee all over the pace, mostly in my lap.

We stopped to check for damage and decided to continue our journey. I filled up at White River and we hit the park. All the way up to Shingwedzi after a few nights at Letaba.

SO asked me about the petrol situation and I proudly said hey, the tank is still just over 1/4 (one quarter full) and with this amount of petrol, I can get all the way to Punda Maria.

We went for an early morning drive to Red Rocks and on the way back, (with my mate behind in his car) we ran out of petrol about 7 km from camp.

I was really mystified about this as the fule guage still showed just under the 1/4 mark.

So we checked out the area for animals, decided the coast was clear and attached the two rope.

It's not nice to have to be towed into camp.

When I got home, I checked the undercarriage of the car to find a massive dent in my petrol tank. This changed the dynamics of how much fuel I could use and why we ran out of gas before the fule tank showed empty.

Still have the dented tank.

Maybe you have some funny / embarrassing stories you can share.

i was wondering if any of you guys had ever had moments of stupidity while in the park, these are just a few of mine from our recent trip.
i've always said that i think most americans leave their brains at home when they go on holiday, or as we say vacation. sadly, i believe that i have become one of those americans.
case in point, a week and half ago my s/o and i are spending a lovely moment on the bridge that is close to the shingwedzi camp, it is one of those bridges that you can get out of your car from.
so we are standing there enjoying the bliss of the park when out of the corner of my eye i see something flying towards the bridge, i say "oh look!" and i point at the beautiful saddle-billed stork that is flying so low to us that it could have basically slapped me on the head with it's wing as it passed, funny thing is...i am pointing at it with my camera, it would have made the most stunning picture! luckily for me my s/o laughed and has yet to let me live down the moment.
the other moment was when we were at a leopard sighting and i was actually trying to take a picture (this time) of a leopard being lazy in a tree but i was having problems focusing because of bush branch in front of me. so i turn to my s/o and say "honey, could you just pull up a bit to get me away from this bush, so i can take a decent picture?" my ever patient s/o turns to me and says "sweetheart, you are driving today" "oh", says i, "yeah i am aren't i?"

Two stupid things I have done is.....
Touch the electric fence at BALULE just to see how powerful the shock realy is.........it is !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Sure most of us have done this before. While at a siting trying to be all smug and quiet so as not to disturb whatever it is you are watching, you decide to quietly and slowly move to a better position for a photo and .."PAAAAAARP"... you by accident leen on the hooter and give everyone the fright of thier lives.

Skydiver
There used to be a topic called "Me, Balule and the electric fence" but I can't find it. Puleease, don't tell me it has disappeared 'cause that was the funniest thread I've ever read!

Hi JenB
I dont know if the thread you are refering to still exists, but to be honest with you, I actualy shocked myself twice in the space of 2 hours on the fence. Once in rehersal for the Darwin Award, and the second time by accident.