Fpr guests recently staying at the Inyati Private Game Reserve, in the Sabi Sands Reserve which forms part of the Greater Kruger Park, they have been treated to some wonderful elephant sightings.

The lodge itself is situated right on the banks of the Sand River, and their particular stretch of the river has become a firm favourite with the eles, providing guests with some awesome game viewing from the lodge deck !

In particular, the elephants seem to congregate together for a midday drink, so what better background for lunch than a herd of elephants – although guests do have to be careful that they remember to eat their delicious lunches inbetween snapping photographs !

As well as the elephants, leopards have visited the lodge too – and one even wandered through camp during dinner one night !

But lets not forget the ‘smaller’ sightings in and around the lodge that have also generated a lot of excitement – such as a small spotted genet, a white tailed mongoose with a black tail, a serval and her cub, and even a Cape clawless otter.

Generally, otters are very rarely seen, but it is thought that the low water level in the Sand River had encouraged this particular otter out of the thick reeds in search of food.

Following on from last weeks listing of top lodges for families in malaria free areas, today we are having a look at our most popular lodges for families in the Greater Kruger area.

The first point to bear in mind when looking at family lodges in the Kruger area is that the average age of children staying at lodges in this area tends to be higher than for lodges in malaria free areas.  There are two reasons for this: firstly, many parents are reluctant to take younger children to a low risk malaria area,  and secondly many of the lodges will have a minimum age of  8 or so and do not tend to run the sort of children’s progams that are offered by many lodges in the Eastern Cape and Madikwe.

The Greater Kruger area is South Africa’s leading safari destination, and for those parents travelling with slightly older children and who are happy to visit an area where it is necessary to take anti-malaria precautions, these lodges all offer an excellent safari experience. The full listing is: 

1 ) Notten’s Bush Camp
2 ) Chitwa Chitwa Game Lodge
3 ) Inyati Private Game Reserve
4 ) Exeter Dulini Private Game Lodge
5 ) Jock Safari Lodge
6 ) Bongani Mountain Camp
7 ) MalaMala Main Camp
8 ) Savanna Private Game Reserve
9 ) Jackalberry Lodge
10 ) Elephant Plains Game Lodge

This listing is ranked on the number of nights children under 12 have spent at each lodge based on recent bookings made by Travel Butlers.