It’s game country that takes some beating, this Sabi Sand. Big Five aplenty on a daily basis, but with such brilliant trackers and rangers that we ended up with a Big 10 by the end of day one.

A superb neck of the woods that shares a south-western border with the Kruger National Park, there is zero fencing which allows game to roam freely between the renowned Kruger and the pristine Sabi Sand. And two mighty rivers, the Sabie and the Sand, do a great job of enticing game into the Sabie Sand reserve.

See most of the Big Five on your first game drive

And it’s game that just keeps on coming.

There’s also an excellent understanding between most of the lodges and private owners in the Sabi Sand Game Reserve. Traversing rights exist across other properties, and are managed superbly so that vehicles simultaneously in one area of the reserve are kept to a minimum. It makes for magnificent, exclusive game viewing.

On our first game drive we rounded a bend and landed in the middle of what appeared to be the AGM of a large herd of buffalo; not much further on, we pulled over to watch a family of white rhino at our leisure, with a herd of impala and grazing giraffe as a backdrop. As we enjoyed gin and tonics and snacks at a waterhole, mom, dad and baby warthog scurried past with perpendicular tales as two elephant bulls affectionately sparred at the water’s edge.

With the sun setting, a fitting end was two male leopard on the prowl along the roadside, joining their father on the hunt.

But that was just the evening and, by the time we were enjoying hot coffee and rusks just after sunrise the next day, we’d extricated ourselves from a massive traffic jam of feeding elephants before spending some time mere metres from three male lion sunning themselves next to the road. Yawning their heads off they eventually settled down to sleep off their feast of the previous night.

The rest of that drive found us watching leopard feeding on duiker, a family of hyena enjoying a morning stroll, and hippo cavorting in a watering hole while a pack of 19 extremely rare wild dogs sunned themselves on the banks.

And the game just kept on coming.