Travel Guide Addo Elephant National Park

One hundred and twenty elephants in twelve months... Nice shot, Major! It's 1919 and Major Pretorius is almost at the end of his tether. The local farmers have paid him to totally exterminate the Zuurberg elephants that are destroying the crops and terrorizing the population. Fortunately, the affair became known and, under the pressure of public opinion, the massacre stopped. Only fifteen elephants remained, sick or wounded. In 1931, eleven survivors found refuge in the newly created reserve. But the problem remained, as the pachyderms trampled on the fences and resumed their raids on the farms; some even settled on the railway tracks! The solution was not found until 1954: a lift manufacturer decided to offer several kilometres of metal cable resistant to elephants. James Stevenson-Hamilton wrote that "they are smaller than the African elephant and most of them are tuskless".Day visitors (7am-7pm) can drive through the reserve in their own vehicle or explore Addo Bush by walking the Spekboom Nature Trail, which takes three to four hours. Out of a total area of over 145,000 ha, some 12,000 ha are reserved for the 400 elephants. Today Addo Elephant National is a must-see. Besides probably the most beautiful scenes of encounters with elephant herds, it stretches beautifully between the bush and the ocean. Several days in Addo are never too much..