Saturday, May 6th.
Slept well but woke up at 4. We were off and driving by 6 without breakfast. Soon after leaving camp, we saw two female lions walking right down the road ahead of us. We followed them for a couple of minutes before they cleverly turned right onto a no entry road. We circled back and then came back again and saw a huge male lion walking in the scrub beside the road towards where the females were going. That was amazing. When it was obvious we weren’t going to see them again we continued and drove a long way without seeing very much other than the usual animals. We had driven straight south and stopped for lunch at Mopani Rest Camp and had a nice meal at the Fish Eagle Terrace which commands a beautiful view of the dammed river. After lunch we drove around some of the loop dirt roads and found a couple of water holes where we could watch different animals interacting. This is where you get to see the African expanse and the iconic views of elephants, zebra, giraffe, wildebeest and impala. We also saw the beautiful secretary bird, which is a tall bird with long legs that kills snakes and lizards by stomping on them. He was weaving around the animals trying to get a drink which spooked the zebras. Later in the afternoon as we were racing back along the road to reach our overnight camp by the deadline of 6 we raced past a leopard! Daisy yelled stop and Andrew hastily reversed back which spooked the leopard. We only got a fleeting look, and I got a couple of sketchy photos, but at least we finally saw one. Shortly after that we came across an antelope that I wanted to see called a nyala. It looks like a small kudu. We also came across a family of baboons camped by a big log with three little ones posing on the log for us, very cute. We drove so far and stopped so many times that we were pressured to get back to camp by 6. Andrew had to drive at warp speed for the last 30 km. We got back at 5:56 (and later found out that we were supposed to get back by 5:30 and we could have been fined!). We tried to book the night drive again, but it only sits 10 and there were already 5 booked. (Why didn’t we book both nights ahead?). We had 7 people who wanted to go, so I bowed out and so did Bruce and Matt. I was annoyed so I took all my stuff off the truck and went straight to the restaurant. They went to their rooms first. I had a beer and listened to some good angry XTC to calm down. I ordered dinner and then they showed up. Andrew was sitting at his own table. I bought him a beer and invited him over to sit with us. We talked about driving for 12 hours and being ordered around by a bunch of tourists. I learned a bit about his life. He’s 53, married and has 5 kids. Andrew and his wife work for the lodge beside us and his five kids live in his house in the town. We had a great time and lots of laughs, the best I’d had in a long time. After dinner, and a couple of beer, Andrew went to his room, and we went back to our room. Bruce and Matt had a couple more beer on our porch while I sorted photos. We went to bed about 10.
The baobab tree is a favourite of mine as well! What amazing sightings of animals and birds you are having on this adventure!
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