The bed we got into in the early hours of this morning was freezing although we warmed it and ourselves up relatively quickly I awoke at 0530am with cold feet and had to put on my socks - feet warm I slept on until 0830am. John ventured onto the cool verandah and collected the flask of hot water that had been left there at 6.30 am ish and made us a two mugs of hot tea each - a much needed wakeup before venturing for a hot shower.
Brunch was just after 10 - the mango I purchased yesterday formed part of my start to the day and Ionna was pleased as she got photos with Vusi, one of the staff - her black Olly Murs and Dillon, her guide of choice!
We then relaxed until our afternoon snacks and 4pm sunset game drive with Dillon.
We went up onto the mountains - luckily the dark ominous clouds dissipated and we didn't have a repeat of yesterday's thunderstorm. As we headed up we saw the beauty and the extent of the reserve - as we climbed we saw kudu, oryx, eland, red hartebeest ( not native) a herd of wildebeest and the lovely resident mountain reedbuck (today's photo). Dillon also explained some of the local plants - silvery leafed protea, baboon tail, which is fire resistant so the bushmen use it to carry embers in to start a fire with at their next camp, the healing leaf shrub with healing leaves but toxic red berries and his new business venture, if oral B and Colgate, go out of business - the tooth brush tree from which he made a rustic toothbrush with its own antibacterial properties - not found in your normal tooth brushes! We also saw a beautiful blue and red gaudy commodore butterfly.
Dinner was a lively affair with banter led by Becky and Dillon punctuated with animal sightings ... A large bush baby which visited for banana, a large spotted genet and bush pigs who came for the scraps. The genet looked to be playing a waiting game but I am not sure there would be much left for her when the pigs had finished.
We then made our way back to our tent sadly for final packing and an early night before we leave tomorrow collecting our camera traps enroute......so still one piece of excitement left!