It was Thursday 7th July 2011 about 11:30 when the call came through. Ryan Brayshaw (Cradle Hotels operations manager) was on the line to let us know Kylie Minogue would be doing a game drive with us. I was thrilled I had answered that call because I quickly volunteered for the job, who could blame me. I quickly got a game viewer ready and by 12:30 was off to pick her up.
At around 13:15 I arrived at the Palace, I was met by the head Concierge who informed me that the game drive had been canceled. My heart sank, but after a few phone calls it turned out that it was a game drive with another company which had been canceled, and ours was still on, what a relief. Time dragged on, but eventually 14:00 arrived and it was time for the drive. There were 7 guests that would be joining me, Kylie her security and Management. I expected all the rest to be on the game viewer first and Kylie to arrive last, however this was not at all the case, Kylie was the first one out. At first I did not recognize her at all, and it was only when she stretched out her hand and introduced herself as Kylie that I clicked, how embarrassing. Eventually we managed to round up the rest of the entourage and it was time to set off, I sat up on my game viewer door and began my safety briefing just like I had done a million times before. When I was done I climbed into my driver’s seat and as I was getting ready to depart, Kylie leaned forward and asked “sorry is it Peter or Pete?” I quickly tried to remember what I had said my name was in my safety briefing, but my mouth did not want to wait for my brain and blurted out, “Peter, Pete, Peety I don’t mind,” damn, I had just become Peety for the rest of the day.
After a short drive we arrived at Bakubung gate, where we entered the park. The first animals we spotted were some zebra about 100m from the road. Not a great sighting by any stretch of the imagination but their excitement was obvious. I knew from here on out it was going to be a fantastic game drive. We carried on a short distance and found some waterbuck, a beautiful big male with some very impressive horns, he was courting some ladies and seemed to be doing quite well. More Impala and wildebeest followed, it took us quite some time just to reach Lengau dam which is only 2km from the gate because the group was enjoying the general game viewing so much. I realized that if we carried on at this pace we would not make it to the lodge on time. The last thing I wanted was for people to think I had gone and kidnapped Kylie Minogue! So I decided to pick up the pace a bit. After we turned onto Ntswe drive the sightings slowed down and we made up a bit of time. By the time we reached Kukama we had made up enough time to chat some more, however the sightings were not around. I spotted some Elephant dung on the side of the road and stopped the game viewer. Jumping out I said “Ok, let’s talk shit,” Kylie just grinned while the rest giggled. After chatting about how we would identify this as elephant dung I mentioned that some believe elephant dung can be smoked to cure a headache. This they were a little skeptical about, but Kylie decided she wanted a photo with the medicinal Elephant dung, I passed it back her expecting her to hold it with two fingers and a disgusted look on her face, but to my surprise she grabbed it with both hands and a big grin. The rest of the car was in hysterics as she posed for various photos. A little further down we found a big Rhino midden and some Mal Pitte growing on it, everyone was quite curious as to what hallucinations these little black seeds of the mal pitte might cause, we also found a nice track of a big male lion, Kylie was in awe of the size of the track. Eventually we reached the Shepherds tree access chain, I was now thinking we were only about 15min away from the lodge, but would you believe it we found the most amazing sighting of giraffe and zebra together just a few hundred meters down the road. We must have spent a good 15 minutes with these guys as they crossed the road all around us, the youngsters playing while the parents browsed and paying little attention to the kids. Cameras clicked and Kylie chuckled as a very young giraffe realized she had been left behind by her mom and ran awkwardly to catch up. By now we were running late for the lodge again and reluctantly had to move on.
We were greeted back at the lodge by the entire Shepherds Tree management team and Spencer on the drums. Kevin (Shepherds Tree GM) showed the group around the lodge and took them through to the cigar lounge where there were cocktails and a roaring fire waiting. Kylie was nice enough to take a group photo with Kevin, Annalie, Monika and myself. I was then lucky enough to be asked to take a photo with just Kylie, she perched herself up on the bonnet of the game viewer and I stood next to her. After enjoying the views of the Pilanesberg and of course the peace and quiet that Shepherds Tree has to offer it was decided to head on back to the Palace. It was obvious that all had enjoyed their visit to the lodge, and I even heard whispers that they were sorry they had not heard about us before booking elsewhere.
Back on the road again to see what else would pop up on the way to the gate. Kylie decided to sit in the front seat next to me for the drive back, I had let her in on the secret of the front heater. Wildebeest, Zebra, Impala were plentiful, but we did not spend too much time with them as we did not want to get caught in the icy darkness the Pilanesberg offers quite early in winter. We were on the hunt for one of the big five, I had to find ONE! Nothing turned up for the first 15min or so then finally, 2 White Rhinos right next to the road. As they heard the noise of the engine approaching they moved off about 10 meters, this allowed us to drive passed them and get a great position for photos. But being Rhinos, they just moved slowly along with heads buried in the grass not really giving us that perfect shot everyone was waiting for. This did not stop the frenzy of photos at all, and cameras clicked away. A few minutes went by and everyone started to get tired of taking photos of Rhino bum and body. Just as Kylie next to me turned off her camera the one big male lifted his head to look at us, I have never seem someone try and turn on a camera so fast, she managed to get it on in time and took the photo, I thought she was going to jump out of the car in excitement. The headlines flashed through my mind “Kylie trampled by rhino, Peety to blame.” Luckily for me she remained seated and I could breathe a sigh of relief. The rest of the drive was quiet as far as game viewing goes, but it did not matter because we were all so happy about the rhino sighting.
On arriving back at the Palace everyone jumped off the game viewer and I said goodbye to them all shaking their hands as they left. Kylie came to say goodbye and I was expecting a hand shake but to my surprise she instead gave me a big hug and thanked me for a wonderful afternoon. I couldn’t help but smile.
It was an unforgettable day for me, and I hope for them as well.
By Peter Breedveld
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