Men on horseback nearly trampled to death by hippos
Two men on horseback were nearly trampled to death yesterday, when two of the three hippos roaming around Middelburg, charged them.
“Both the horses started to buck during the charge. Colin said afterwards that he had never been so scared in his life,” Mr Mohamed Panchbhai told www.mobserver.co.za.
Mr Panchbhai saw on www.mobserver.co.za that members of the Mpumalanga Tourism and Parks Agency asked people to notify them if they spot the hippos.
He contacted www.mobserver.co.za yesterday and said that he saw them over the weekend in the bushes at the river around the smallholdings at the back of Eastdene.
Mr Panchbhai decided to return to the area to see if the hippos were still there. He and Mr Colin Masobe saddled up around 17:00 and approached the area with caution.
They tried to be as quiet as possible as they heard noises coming from the riverside, “As we approached the river bed, one of the horses stepped on a branch and it made quite a loud crack.”
The next moment they heard a big splash in the water and thundering footsteps behind them. Mr Panchbhai told Mr Masobe that they must rather leave.
“The next moment we saw a huge object running right towards us and we both froze out of shock because we didn’t expect it! The minute I realised what was actually happening, I swerved my horse out of the bushes, and Colin’s horse followed. Luckily they didn’t follow us, because the horses were also trembling with fear.”
Mr Panchbhai said that one hippo came from the riverside, and the other hippo was running towards the river. They did not see the baby hippo, but he thinks it was probably in the water, or grazing with the mother.
Mr Panchbhai urges “people not to go near them at all. They are super territorial”.
• Over the weekend, he took a video showing the hippos in the background on their way to the river.
