Addo Elephant
National Park

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The Addo Elephant National Park is one of the most worthwhile areas to visit while you are in the Eastern Cape Province and is touted as one of the most exciting and ambitious conservation projects ever to be undertaken in South Africa.  Lying deep within the dense valley bushveld of the Sundays River region about an hours drive north of Port Elizabeth it is the home to over 350 elephants.  There are a variety of natural landscapes and wildlife species that all can be experienced here in one destination.

The first settlers in the Addo region immediately decimated the big elephant hers as they frequently devastated their fields and plantations.  Soon the number of elephants continued to decrease until there was eventually only 11 left.  In 1931 Addo Elephant Park was established to protect these remaining elephants.  The surviving elephants were known to be highly aggressive.  In an attempt to mollify them, they were fed whole truck loads of rotting oranges.  This experiment was successful and the elephant population started to grow again.  These special feedings were soon stopped, but still today the elephants are mad for oranges and will smash any car if they sense the smell of their favorite fruit in it.  Thus even today oranges are forbidden to be brought into the park.

Beside the large number of elephants that are in the park, it is also home to all of the Big 5 and many species of other animals including Kudu, Eland, Red Hartebeest, Bushbuck, Zebra and Warthogs just to name a few.  Addo's birding opportunity is very impressive with more than 150 different species having been recorded there.  Species range from the ostrich, through numerous waterfowl along with many raptor.  Addo is also one of the few homes to the flightless dung beetle.  Previously widespread in the country, this beetle is now restricted in particular to the Addo area.  They're regularly encountered in the park rolling their balls of dung to some suitable spot where it is buried.  With all of the elephants in the park, they have plenty of material available at their disposal.

Of the Big Five, beside the elephant, there has always been a resident population of Cape Buffalo although the Addo Buffalo rarely forms large hers as elsewhere in Africa but live in small family groups.  The Addo Buffalo are the only Cape Buffalo to have survived into the 20th century in the Cape Province.  Although fairly scarce in this part of South Africa, Addo also contains a population of Leopard.  In 1962 a breeding population of the Black Rhinoceros was introduced and there is a current population of 38 of these animals.  A recent introduction of Lion (absent since 1879) have been doing well and in December of 2005 three young lion cubs, believed to be about 4 months old, were spotted by visitors to the park.

There are a wide variety of activities for visitors to this park and they include wildlife viewing from their own vehicles, guided drives, horse rides, hiking trails, picnic areas and also a shop and a restaurant.  For further information, visit their web site at http://www.addoelephantpark.com

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Booking Agent and Co-Webmaster - Robert Clark, Co-Webmaster - Leesa Clark - Page updated February 11, 2008