An interesting "tradition":
Stefan de Villiers
4 hours ago
MBOMBELA – If you think that you’re a Krugerholic, you ain’t seen nothing yet.
Liam Mackail’s (22) tattoos are for passion, not for fashion. A passion so strong that he decided to puncture indelible pictures of the park into the skin of his arm.
Born in Mbombela and later relocated to Scotland, Mackail could not wait to be old enough to put his passion for the park onto his arm.
“My mother and her family have been going to the Kruger National Park (KNP) since she was six years old. They love the Kruger and started taking me and my brother and sister to the park from a very young age. We come over to visit my mom’s family every year and try to go to the park when we can,” said Mackail.
So as a “Kruger addict”, he decided to put his passion onto his arm. He started off with a tattoo of a lion, based on a photo that was taken by a family friend. Next he asked his uncle for one of his leopard photos. Then, came an elephant and a buffalo – photos taken by his mother. “The rhino was one of my dad’s photos.”
“I still had a lot of arm space so decided then that I would add a picture of the full moon that my mom took at Pretoriuskop last year. I also took a picture of the hut that we stayed in and decided that would be pretty cool as well. It turned out that we ended up in the same huts this year,” he said.
For the past two years he has been bringing friends over and this year his girlfriend, Laura Archibald came along. “It’s her first visit to South Africa and the KNP. We made a joke that we would do a trip of my arm and try and spot everything on it. We were surprised when we ended up in the same hut. We also went to Skukuza to show Laura the Selati bridge, which I also added to my arm this year,” he said.
They ended up sighting everything on his arm apart from the baobab. “I also have an acacia tree,” he said. “I know some people don’t agree with my tattoos, but it’s a personal thing and I love them. They are special to me because I love Africa and especially the Kruger. Also, all the photos were taken by me, my family and our friend,” he said.
https://lowvelder.co.za/443649/kruger-tattoos/