Morning Drive 9/18

The next morning, we all met at 6 AM for coffee and went on Morning Drive. Afke had stayed over at Main Camp and joined us. One of our first sightings was part of the eland herd:

When our Ranger, Elvis caught me taking a picture of this dead tree, he was a little worried.  "It's dead!  It's a dead tree!" he announced.  I explained to him that my favorite subjects for photography tended to stay in one place for a very long time and that this bendy, twisted tree seemed to fit the bill nicely, he accepted that with good grace.  But I noticed that every once in a while, he'd look over at me and shake his head.  lolol!

We saw lots of birds like hornbills, francolin, lilac-breasted roller, eagles; impala and steenbok,lots of squirrels and several hyenas.  This little steenbok was very curious:

There were always wildies

and frequently hyenas:

One of the most exciting sightings of the day was finding three young adult cheetahs lying under a tree:

The three cheetahs seemed watchful about something, and we discovered that they were nervous because they had heard horses galloping some distance away.  In the far distance, we saw a group from Horse Safaris riding along, and learned that cheetahs do not like horses!

A short distance away two more cheetahs, mother and son, were being tracked by yet another hyena.

Once the hyena saw the cheetahs were moving and had no prey, s/he moved away.

We also saw a large group of giraffes, all ages and sizes, as well as one or two on their own.  (yes, I know, a journey of giraffes....who makes this stuff up, anyway? lolol!)

And a scrub hare:

. When we stopped for coffee and rusk, almost all the men disappeared behind one bush or another for personal reasons. Afke, who was wearing shorts and feeling cold, started jogging about to warm up, but every time she started to head around a bush, she did an about-face and came running back, having discovered that just about every bush in the area concealed one of the men in our group. The only one who hadn't vanished as soon as the vehicle stopped was Aaron, who was busy making sure we all had our coffee just the way we liked it. He had a hard time not laughing when he saw what was happening, and the rest of us couldn't stop giggling.. It was one of the funniest sightings of the day!

When they returned from their respective bushes, Michael and Gary found some interesting stones on the ground...agates and such. We picked up a few to take home to Douglas. As we headed back to Main Camp, we saw still more giraffes. Another great drive! We all had brunch together and were joined by Andrei, rescuer of Skirminkel and in charge of the Predator Drive, which Susan, Doug and I had signed up for. We were joined by Rebecca, a Mashatu volunteer. Michael and Gary went out with Elvis and Aaron on evening drive, and Afke headed back to the hide.

The Predator Drive

Andrei was disappointed that the Predator Drive didn't meet his expectations, but it was interesting and definitely gave us some insight into the work he does. He showed us how he caught and collared leopards, and we tracked one that he had recently collared, after quite a hunt, to the northwest of Tent Camp. We could hear the signal beeping faster and faster as we got closer to him. He was very clever, though, and each time we saw him on the far bank of the ravine and tried to get to that side, we would discover that he had managed to move to the other side. He was one step ahead of us all the time, and we never did quite catch him. I was very glad I had brought a warm sweater and a fleece vest....it was much cooler today.

18 Sept 09

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