“ NO RHINO, NO FEATURE” This was the warning from editor Rix. Not something you'd usually overhear in the Top Gear office, of course, but then I had just suggested that we could put the new South African-built Volkswagen Amarok to the test by deploying it with one of the many anti-poaching teams looking after resident rhinoceroses in the posh pickup's new home.
Now dear reader, I wish I could claim that with this ultimatum ringing in my and photographer Fleetwood's ears - we set off searching for our horned friends across the African savanna for days on end, traversing tricky terrain in the Amarok and avoiding the more bitey creatures around with the hope of possibly catching a glimpse of one of the circa 16,000 white rhinos in existence.
As you may be able to tell from the remarkable images on these pages, it wasn't like that.
In fact, the Anti-Poaching Unit (APU) at Gondwana game reserve four hours east of Cape Town has such incredible data, knowledge and tracking ability that we manage to get our off-road spec Amarok Pan-Americana in the frame with some of these majestic 2.5-tonne grazers in a matter of hours. Success.
That's not to say that the escapade is without jeopardy - the two rhino brothers we approach first are incredibly calm and happy to be papped, but as is often the case, the danger is a man-made creation.
Thanks to its huge anti-poaching efforts, Gondwana hasn't had an incident since the reserve was established in 2006, but the protection of rhinos is a perilous business to be involved in.
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