Beaufort West - are you kidding?

Unlike Stellenbosch or Cape Town or about anyplace else we’ve visited, Beaufort West is generally not considered a vacation destination.  Au contraire, it’s mostly a truckers’ stop between Cape Town and Johannesburg.  This is a typically sized truck - much larger than in the US.



However, we discovered a great B&B the last time we were here, and it’s also located at the entrance to Karoo National Park, home to all kinds of wild critters, like these kudus.



We saw a lot of mountain zebras, but we weren’t able to get a good picture.  Have you ever wondered why zebras are striped - and how that could possibly be an advantage in the wild?  Well, they blend in to shadows remarkably well.  So well that they’re hard to photograph.

Karoo National Park is also home to five species of tortoise.


This sign is important - when we finally found one, it was lumbering across the parking lot at the visitors center!  This fellow was about 30 inches long.














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