Tea arrived at 5.45, one of the room stewards shouted good morning, I thought he had put it down outside for us to collect so I sauntered around before going out to collect it. As I opened the door I saw him still standing there with tea in hand. I apologised and promised not to leave him standing there again and would do better tomorrow!
We left at 0630 taking a picnic breakfast, our travel companions were a great young American couple, Hiroko, who originates from Japan, and now works for Delta Airlines and husband Dan an IT professional for a hedge fund. This was their first safari and they were smitten by what they saw and very inquisitive....indeed at dinner Hiroko was asked what her name meant by another guest - she didn't know - I suggested it was - girl who asks many questions - her husband roared with laughter and said that was spot on!
As we left camp we saw hyena, I then had my good eye in and spotted alone lion walking across the granite boulder strewn landscape......this started lion day as John and Hiroko then spotted male lions sitting on a rock, this was followed by finding a pride- a male and 4-5 females - we spied two cubs hidden in the undergrowth but when the mothers called 8 bounded out aged between 2-4 months. We spent ages watching them be cubs - playing and feeding. One is today's picture. On our way back in for lunch we spotted the rhino again, now much closer to the lodge, mama Julie was wallowing in a water filled hollow and her son was making squeaky sounds ( a bit whimpish really) not sure what he wanted but there was plenty of room for him too and he settled besides his mum in the wallow. We also saw wildebeest massing on the river bank - but no crossing - the guides think recent rains have made the river too high.
After lunch I went for a swim prior to our 4pm game drive and leopard search.
No leopard but we saw another pride of lions with much bigger cubs - 6 months plus- these are the local pride and the same ones we saw on the kopie last night. We also saw kilpspringer, standing on rocks, martial eagle, a spotted eagle owl, a wildebeest still moving along but obviously with a broken leg - he still had others with him but I am sure the lions somewhere will have him for dinner! A squirrel which looked more like a mongoose with a black tip to his tail, a lovely mauve backed starling and dung beetles making those balls we saw on our walk at Naibosho in which they lay their eggs. It looked as they were rolling the balls as if another beetle was getting a free ride - that was the female - having got his girl he wanted her to stay otherwise his work would be in vain - so the free ride was really part of taking her away from other males!
Another good day ending with watching that local pride of lions again and drinking our mango juice sundowner out of the carton and an empty water bottle as for obvious reasons it was difficult to get the glasses out of the back of the truck!
On our return to the lodge it was the same routine - shower, change - call for an escort as it was now dark,(you never know what is in the bushes so the camps insist on an Askari, usually from a local village; they carry a variety of weapons- bow and arrow, spear and sometimes a gun), a drink by the campfire and dinner - followed by sleep - again very easy to drop off!