Our original plan for Kruger National Park was to do it entirely self-driving with one exception – a Kruger Park Bush Braai with Royal Safaris.
Our friends Carrie and Jim (who we were staying with) were the ones who recommended the Bush Braai experience. In case you’re not familiar with what a South African braai is (I wasn’t before our visit), it’s an outdoor barbecue where you grill meat, but it also seems to have a social element where you have other people over for the experience too.
In the case of the Kruger Park Bush Braai, you start off with an afternoon guided safari of Kruger National Park, then you have a braai dinner at their site in the bush of Kruger National Park. Royal Safaris is currently the only group which has a license to run a Bush Braai, so this was a one-of-a-kind experience.
Getting Picked Up
We were staying in Marloth Park which is just outside Kruger National Park. It’s one of the two locations where Royal Safaris can pick you up for the Bush Braai, so that’s where we arranged to be picked up from and dropped off at.
If you’re not staying in Marloth Park, the other pickup option is from the Crocodile Bridge Gate which is one of the entrances on the south side of Kruger. There’s a small parking lot just outside of the entrance where you can leave your vehicle when getting picked up by Royal Safaris.
Kruger Park Safari
We arrived at the Crocodile Bridge Gate at about 4pm where Xander – our guide – went inside to arrange for our entrance to the park. It wasn’t long before we were inside cruising around looking for wildlife.
As you can see in the photo above, the safari is in an open air vehicle which gives great views on all sides. There are three rows of passenger seats with space for 2-3 people in each row. Each row of seating is elevated behind the row in front of it which helps ensure everyone gets a great view even if an animal is in the road in front of you.
The Kruger Park Bush Braai experience isn’t necessarily a private tour, but we got lucky in that it was for us. There were the four of us (me, Shae and Shae’s mom and stepdad), while three other people were supposed to also be on the tour. They ended up having to cancel last minute, so we got to have all of Xander’s attention (poor guy 😉 )
Within a few minutes of entering the park we’d already spotted some giraffes, a hippo (mostly submerged in water) and some elephants.
One of the benefits of having a guided tour rather than doing a self-guided safari is that you can learn so much more information. For example, we learned that baby wildebeest are a light shade of brown to make it easier for them to hide. Another surprising fact was that unlike some animals that struggle to find their legs soon after birth, baby wildebeest are able to move as fast as their mother within an hour of birth.
Another benefit of a guided tour is that your guide will be able to point things out to you that you’d otherwise have missed. For example, there’s no way that we would’ve spotted the small remains of a warthog ribcage without him. This warthog had apparently been killed by lions the previous day, with vultures picking the carcass clean afterwards.
A third benefit of a guided tour is that sometimes you’ll learn about sightings of animals thanks to guides communicating with each other either over walkie-talkie or in their own private WhatsApp groups.
We got to be on both sides of this. We spotted a pride of lions wandering around slowly and resting after a kill and were able to share the location with the other Royal Safaris group that night.
Later on, that other group spotted a different pride of lions laying down elsewhere, so we raced over to see them.
The guides sometimes get to benefit from us guests too! Shae’s stepdad somehow managed to spot an ostrich in the distance which was the first time our guide had seen one in Kruger National Park in the previous 8 months.
We continued driving around as it got darker. That didn’t mean the animal spotting was over though. Royal Safaris drivers have a couple of powerful flashlights to shine on both sides of the vehicle. Xander shone the light on the right side of the vehicle (they drive on the right side of the car in South Africa), while I shone the other light off to the left.
The great thing about the lights is that in some ways it made it easier to see animals than in the daytime. That’s because the lights would reflect on animals’ eyes as you drove by, so you knew if something was there or not. A lot of the time it was impala; there are 100,000+ impala in Kruger National Park and so even though they’re cute, they’re not at all unusual to see. Other times though we spotted other wildlife like giraffes and a hyena crossing the road.
Bush Braai
At about 7:45pm we arrived at their Bush Braai site for dinner which also had restrooms for people to use. The men’s “restroom” was fairly primitive, consisting of piping inserted at an angle into the ground, although there was a separate normal toilet for both men and women to use.
The site itself had a cute setup with nice lighting, a fire pit in the middle and a long dining table off to the side. The area had electric fencing around the edge to help protect from wildlife seeing as it’s inside Kruger National Park.
The Bush Braai includes dinner plus up to four drinks, with the drinks including soft drinks, beer, cider and wine. I decided to try a local Castle beer which was pretty good.
After sitting around the fire for a little while it was time for dinner which was prepared by Precious (whose birthday it was that day) and Duma. Dinner was served buffet-style, with several types of meat, vegetables, salad, pap (a South African polenta-type food), corn, fruit and more.
There was plenty of food and it was all very tasty.
That was followed up by dessert. There were metal sticks for roasting marshmallows, a small cup of Amarula – a South African liqueur made with the marula fruit – and something else that I can’t remember (possibly ice cream?).
Drive Back – More Animals!
After the braai finished, it was time to head back to Marloth Park. We’d barely left the camp when Xander said “No way!” and stopped the car. He hopped out and went over to a tree, but we had no clue initially what he’d seen.
It turns out that there was a baby chameleon he’d spotted on a branch. I’ve no idea how he spotted it as it was so tiny, but we were glad he did.
We continued using the powerful flashlights on the way back and it helped us spot some more wildlife. That includes what I think was an African wild cat, as well as a turtle and hippopotamus.
Final Thoughts
We had a great time doing the Kruger Park Bush Braai experience with Royal Safaris. It was nice having someone else driving us through the park, as well as learning all kinds of information about the wildlife we were seeing. We also got to see several types of animals during this tour that we didn’t see at other times, plus the dinner by firelight was lovely.
How Much Is A Kruger Park Bush Braai?
We paid 1,995 Rand per person which was about $110 per person when we visited in January/February 2023. That felt like good value seeing as it included a guided tour for 3.5 hours, dinner and then more animals on the way back. That amount includes the fee to enter Kruger National Park which was ~$25 per person when we visited, but doesn’t include tip.
How Do You Book The Bush Braai Experience?
We booked the Bush Braai with Royal Safaris via their website, although it looks like they use a third party to process reservations for their different tours.
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