"I Tawt I Taw a Puddy Tat" - Emdoneni Lodge, Hluhluwe, South Africa

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Juba the Cheetah

While we were in Swaziland the first time, we met some students on a three week volunteer trip of South Africa. One of their projects had been a cat sanctuary in Zululand looking after Cheetahs and African Wild Cats.

Martin and I are not into zoos at all, but couldn't resist the chance to stroke a big cat!
It seemed that seeing St Lucia and its parks were quite expensive on tours, so we decided to hire a car to get around and see some of the sights at our own pace (and definitely more cheaply).  Luckily, I vaguely remembered at the last minute about the cat sanctuary recommendation!!

The two male cheetahs

Michelle with two male Cheetahs

Emdoneni Lodge was only a forty five minute drive north of St. Lucia, and when we arrived there was no one around while we waited for the tour to start. Just as we were thinking we might be the only ones there and get to enjoy some great time with the cats by ourselves, suddenly car after car pulled up with bundles of parents and kids (probably about 40 in the end).  Our timing was clearly, off - it was a Saturday and probably the worst time to do something like this.  So we were not to enjoy the cats in relative peace. In spite of this, it still turned out to be a very cool experience. We learned about the four different types of cats that they have at the sanctuary - four African Wild Cats, eight Caracols, nine Servals and then saving the best 'til last - four cheetahs. The wild cats looked just like domestic alley cats to us. The Caracols were perhaps the most interesting with their tufted ears (like a lynx) and they could jump about 3m to catch the meat slung over the fencing in mid-air.

Our favourites, of course, were the cheetahs. So beautiful and placid. Everyone had a chance to pet them and have their photo taken with the great cats. We spent quite a time stroking them and just chilling with them. It was surprising how the trainers were quite generous with the time, considering the group was so large!!  They seemed very placid and and you could tell that they really enjoyed being petted and stroked. There eyes would be semi-closed in bliss while they purred like a 1200cc motorcycle from distance - just like an overgrown house cat!  One of them rolled over on to Martin's foot and he almost gave it a tummy rub... but who knows what might have happened - like most domestic cats you don't touch their tummies or their tails. The special moment for me was when Juba started licking my hand and wouldn't stop. His tongue was super rough!

It was a profound and puuurrrfect experience. * Mush