Our third day began with an early morning swim and breakfast at the Gumtree guest house.

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We then decided to go to the Cango Wildlife Ranch just a few kilometres away. The ranch was originally built in 1977 when it was used to farm crocodiles for sale. In 1986 it was taken over and the new owners decided to focus on animal conservation, particularly of cheetahs. There are now around 50 species of animal there from bats to lions. There is a private semi-wild area to the park where animals are kept in as close to wild conditions how can i buy viagra in canada as possible. The public area has animals which were tamed as they grew up, allowing the staff to look after them fully and use them to educate visitors on their imminent risk of extinction. Many of the species there have a worldwide population of just a few hundred.

When we first arrived, we had a very interesting tour through the main parts of the ranch. This included meerkats, lemurs, bats, vultures, emus, antelope, hippos, otters, crocodiles, cheetahs, leopards, white Bengal tigers, tiger cubs, lions, various native birds and quite a few more! There was then a unique opportunity to take part in ‘natural encounters’, each allowing us to spend 15-20 minutes in an enclosure with the animals. First of all we met the very playful and athletic lemurs who would happily jump from the trees onto our shoulders. It is estimated that they will be completely extinct from the wild within 30 years. Next we spent some time with one of the cheetahs who had a typical cat-like purr – just a little louder! Finally I decided to do some crocodile cage diving which is a very rare but facinating experience.

The ranch was so enjoyable that we ended up staying for lunch and spending most of the afternoon there – mainly watching the tiger cubs playing and being fed! After that it was back on the mountain roads to Wilderness, a coastal town on the official Garden Route. We checked in to our appartment at a guest house in the hills just outside the town centre before finding the beach in time for a quick paddle before sunset. Finally we headed to Cocomo for dinner – a vibrant restaurant with live music on a Sunday night.