Game On

Jet-lagged but brimming with enthusiasm, Rachael Russell slaps on her akubra and takes to the African veldt in pursuit of the ‘Big Five’.

- Rachael Russell

He picks me off at the gate, separated, tired and vulnerable. I’ve just landed at OR Tambo International Airport in Johannesburg after a 19hour flight from Auckland and am desperate to make my connection to Durban. I’ll be travelling through South Africa with other journalists, but we don’t know each other yet, so there’s no safety in numbers. An airport ‘employee’, in blazer and lanyard, spots my anxiety. He grabs my passport and boarding pass, tells me I’m going to miss my flight, but he can help. For a price...

At the next gate I find the others and realise my mistake – the plane hasn’t even boarded yet. Two others were similarly scammed. It didn’t cost me that much – a few hundred rand, which is about $60, to ‘make’ a flight I had plenty of time for. Still, I’m so angry I have to fight back tears. So here’s the first lesson of South Africa: be wary. But don’t let that put you off, because I’d pay that money 10 times over for the experience that was about to unfold.

We’ve travelled to this country for the stunning landscapes, the sunsets… but most of all, to go on safari. After a few days of city sightseeing that serves to get us over some major jet lag and in peak holiday form, we hop a federal air service plane to our bucket-list destination.