Kudus and Photography Group

 

A very friendly giraffe.

A white-faced vulture.

Male kudu pursuing two females.

Male kudu.

A bushbuck.

Guinea fowl and chicks... a group of them is called a confusion...

Female kudu

Oxpecker eating tics off of a giraffe.

The photography group with our cameras.

Monday, April 24^th.

We had another morning game drive, the first half of which was very quiet. We saw one small elephant hiding in a bush, one giraffe and one kudu. Then we stopped for our coffee break. After that sightings picked up and we saw lots of impala, kudu, giraffe and waterbucks. We returned to camp about 10 and hung out for a while before lunch. After lunch we had a lecture on birding and bird photography. I asked Paula (our leader) for some help with importing and exporting pictures and files into LightRoom Classic. Then we had an afternoon game drive. This was to be our ‘gin’ drive like last Monday. We drove for two hours looking for wildlife and saw some of the usual. We finally arrived at our ‘picnic’ spot where we were to have our drink welcoming the new people to the group, but there was an elephant right behind the bushes, so we drove for another twenty minutes to a second spot. Again there was an elephant nearby but the drivers decided to let us get out of the cars and have the drink. We left after about twenty minutes without any problem but on the way back as it was getting dark we ran into two elephants. The first one blocked our way on the road for a couple of minutes and the second one trumpeted at us. Elephants don’t see well in the dark and they know predators are around more at night, so they are more skittish and irritable. He blasted us twice from close range basically saying get out of my way. We were on a hill and Dylan our driver stalled the car twice. We were afraid the elephant was going to charge, but Dylan talked gently and reassuringly to it and it didn’t come nearer. Then, when we finally got back to camp we found that another elephant had walked right through camp at sunset. Between the camp wall and the river there is about twenty feet of grass and the elephant traversed that and then turned around and came back before leaving. Amazing day of elephants. Then we had dinner. Timo, the photography intern, decided to take a few pictures of all the cameras and lens of the members of the photography group. He lined them all up and I had someone take a picture of us with the gear. They estimated it to be about $100,000 worth! He said he’s seen camera stores with less. Early to bed again as we have another early morning.