Loskop Dam

A Quick Trip... East

- 03 January 2014 -

I called up Scott on the evening of the 2nd January 2014, a Thursday, to accompany me for a drive to Loskop Dam, approximately 200km from Pretoria, about a 2 hour drive. 

It has been many many years since I visited this dam, and wanted to check it out again.

The plan was to wake up very early and leave in the dark, to arrive round about sunrise, this meant that it being the summer months leaving at 4:00am would still be cutting it close, but leaving earlier just didn't feel right. So I set my alarm for 3:30am and told Scott to expect me at about 4:00am..... that was the plan. I over slept, eventually at about 5:30am or so, I got a call from Scott asking where I was.... damn I hate it when that happens, I must have switched my alarm off in my sleep, I jumped out of bed, grabbed a cup of coffee and set off to collect a frustrated Scott.

We arrived at the dam at about 7:30, an hour and half later than I wanted, but what can I do.

We drove around a bit checking out the area, but then headed for the Loskop Dam Nature Reserve, paid a small fee, and entered.

The nature reserve has a combination of animals, consisting of various different antelope, some giraffe, some monkeys and lots of birds. Our first stop was at a bird hide, to our surprise there were a couple of cars parked nearby. As we approached the hide, it was clear that the only company we could expect this time of the morning were other photographers, trying to catch the perfect photo of the morning birds.

Once done at the bird hide, I inspected the GPS and headed in the direction of the water. There were a couple of boats on the water, but other than that it was very peaceful.

We were reluctant to leave the waters edge, but our plan wasn't to spend the entire day here so we moved on, first stopping at a couple more bird hides crammed with some more bird photographers, but as we explore red the dusty parks roads we soon spotted various animals on our route.

We spotted some giraffe, some interesting birds and some antelope.... we looped round the nature reserve and headed to the exit. We were done here, and soon we were on the main highway heading back to Gauteng. We stopped at a coffee shop on the route, ordered an excellent coffee and the required breakfast and arrived back home at about lunchtime. It was a short trip, but I think it is worth a visit again, maybe a stay over in one of the many lodges found in the area, but this time for a whole weekend.