In an ideal world, you’d have the whole park to yourself. But this isn’t an ideal world, and if you were to have the place to yourself, you’d probably be incredibly bored and have pretty much no one else to share your awe with when you arrive at the sighting of something truly incredible.

The Kruger National Park is a wild destination, but only for the animals. When you are on a Kruger Park safari, you will want to make sure that you are on your best behaviour, so that both your time and that of the other guests around you, is memorable for all of the right reasons.

The team at Elephant Herd are known for providing guests with the most memorable safari experience. And while guided safaris are great, guests who want to drive themselves through the park can benefit from having some tips about park etiquette.

For the most part, those who are visiting the park are friendly and kind to fellow road users, because they have been coming to the park often enough to know the unspoken rules. The Kruger is easy to navigate and if you want to make sure that you are a good park guest, keep these tips in mind.

Road and Sightings Etiquette

  1. Drive slowly. In general, there is no area in the park where guests are allowed to drive faster than 50 km an hour. So you should already be driving fairly slowly when coming up to an animal sighting. When you see there is something interesting in the distance, slow down well before you arrive at the sighting.
  2. Pull to the side. When at a wildlife sighting, you will want to slowly and carefully pull as close to the edge of the road as possible. This will allow you to enjoy the sighting for a while, without the worry that you are blocking the road for other road users.
  3. Don’t make loud noises. Whether it is talking loudly or even shouting, or if you are just playing music really loudly, you’ll want to tone it down if you don’t want to anger fellow guests or scare wildlife away.
  4. Don’t hog the scene. While you will probably be tempted to sit at a sighting for a while, there is a lot of park to explore and there are others wanting to catch sight of the animal you are looking at. So spend a few minutes taking the experience in and then move on so someone else can enjoy it.
  5. Stay in your vehicle. You’d think this is quite obvious advice but in reality, there are still those people who get out of their vehicles to either get a better photo or to encourage the animal to do something. This is a foolish thing to do when you are in a park with wildlife that only knows freedom.

It also helps, when on your Kruger Park safari, to just be friendly and kind to each other. When you pass someone on the road, slow down and have a chat. Not only will it help you find other wildlife sightings, but it will also make your experience a more memorable one.