Africa Day Six - Morning Game Drive

So, I know I mentioned bats in the title of the last post, and then totally failed to deliver the bat story. Sorry about that! In short, it is as follows:

After the incident with the camera flash causing the Pearl Spotted Owl to fall out of the tree, Gavin showed us to our tent and we went rather gratefully to bed - very tired indeed. We could hear Hyena whooping in the distance, and strangely the sound began to put me to sleep. Just as I was on the cusp of total somnolence, Sandy leaned over and whispered in my ear; "do you know what that sound is?" and I mumbled, "what? no..." because I had no idea what sound he was talking about. He whispered back, "a blind owl."

*rolls eyes* Goofy man.

Anyway, that evening I slept somewhat poorly - once again troubled by strange Malarone dreams. Toward dawn, my dream turned boring - consisting only of a man saying the name "Dan" over and over and over again. My dreaming mind registered the strangeness of it, rejected it, and forced me awake to deal with it. But when I woke up I realized that the man was still standing right outside my tent, saying "Dan" over and over and over again. What could it mean? Why was there a man outside my tent saying ANYTHING? What the hell? At breakfast, I sidled over to Gavin and mentioned it, and he laughed at me and said, "well actually most people hear it as 'when' but what you heard was the mating call of a male Peter's Epauletted Fruit Bat." That's them in the photograph above, roosting under Nancy's tent roof.

So. Breakfast, and then off to our game drive. At dinner the night before there'd been a bit of an argument. When you've got a large family all traveling in pretty close confines together, that sort of thing is inevitable, I think. Especially in a family with SEVEN kids - not all of whom see eye to eye even under normal circumstances. In brief, the tussle was over a helicopter game drive. There were ten of us on the trip, and the helicopter could only hold four at a time. When Gavin had first told us it was an option, he'd said you could get some really lovely photos from the helicopter, especially in the morning when the light was best. Because there were so many of us wishing to do it, the helicopter would have to make two trips - one in the late afternoon of the sixth day, and the other in the morning of the seventh day. And all eight of the people wishing to go on the helicopter of course wished to go when they could get the best photos. So at dinner, when the subject of arranging the groups for each trip came up, a few people called out immediately, "we want to go in the morning." I mentioned to the table that I didn't care when I went, but that Sandy had really wanted to go in the morning to get the best shots - he had the best photo equipment on the trip to take advantage of the light. Sandy is not always very good at sticking up for himself. One of his sisters replied; "well too bad, four people have already called it." The rest of us resolved that we didn't mind very much if it was so important to the others, and so the groups were formed. Having won their point, the morning group then spent a half-hour of dinner loudly stating to one another that they believed that it wouldn't matter, that the afternoon and morning would be EXACTLY the same. And anyway, they muttered, THEY didn't have National Geographic cameras, so THEY should go when the light was best. A dig directed at poor Sandy and his Baby lens. The inconsistency of these comments did not appear to occur to them. And I regret that I felt it all a bit keenly, didn't handle it well, and so I was dull and depressed on Sandy's behalf all through the meal. Dinner that evening was a bit uncomfortable. I'm not a perfect person, far far from it, and I take things personally when I shouldn't. It's a failing. I'm working on it.

Still, we were ultimately just grateful to be going at all. Sandy's brother Tim had very, very graciously allowed that he didn't really mind not going since only 8 could be accommodated, and he decided to do a Mokoru paddle trip down the river instead. Both Sandy's sister Nora and I told him we didn't mind staying back if he wanted to go - it was his birthday and we all felt it was unfair for him to take one for the team - but he insisted that he didn't mind, and he was a very good sport about it. He planned his Mokoru trip for the afternoon instead. Sandy's mother Nancy said she didn't mind not going either,and again Nora and I offered to stay behind so she could go, but she refused. And so she and the group that had called the morning trip would go on an afternoon safari while the afternoon heli group was in the air, and then she would come on safari with us while the morning group was in the air on the seventh day. And really, she probably made the best call of all of us, because she was on both ground safaris, and so got to see BOTH amazing groups of...but I don't want to spoil the surprise.

And thus our plan for the day was formed. The morning game drive, and then lunch, the afternoon break, and then the helicopter ride in the late afternoon. And that afternoon we had very good cause to be grateful to the behavior of the others at dinner the night before...but then I'm getting ahead of myself again!

I hope you'll all forgive me, incidentally, for relating the good with the bad - I wrestled a bit with my conscience over it, but ultimately I think a story needs a bit of conflict. *laughing* And I want this to be a faithful recitation of the trip.

So - we were off! Our final full day at Chief's camp. The first thing we saw were two Red Lechwes having a play-scuffle out in the wet. Lechwes like the wetlands, and Gavin told us we might remember their name by thinking Liquid-Lechwes. These two weren't contesting in earnest, they were just practicing and honing their skills.

Next up was a giraffe. I can't help but think that giraffe are very silly creatures. They frequently stand behind small bushes and appear to believe that this is sufficient camouflage and that thus concealed they are safe from view. This in spite of the fact that the bush is not 18 feet tall.

We can still see you, mate.

Meyer's Parrots

The spoor of a lion, with genet spoor crossing it.

Some Crested Frankolins

We got a call from the other vehicle at that moment, telling us they'd spotted a lioness. We went to meet up with them, but approached from the opposite side of the field - which meant that we alone ran into the large group of Hyena.

A few ran straight past us. This one stopped when Gavin made a little hyena noise in his throat, and walked around us to identify the interloper.

We could see the other vehicle across the field, following the lioness.

Gavin resolved to continue on the side of the field we were on, and park in front of her, so that she might walk right past us. As we drove along, we came across two more hyena, these guarding a few bones left from a kill.

One of these hyena was pretty manky. But the other was a Show Hyena!

I don't know. I think he's very handsome.

We reached the top of the field a few minutes before the lioness came up. Gavin parked and turned the vehicle off, and we sat quietly, taking photographs of her with our zoom lenses all the way out, trying to get some good shots of her because the light was really beautiful.

We were snapping shots furiously, as she was facing us and the light was lovely and everything was perfect. She was walking towards us, and we were photographing her and slowly recalling our zoom lenses to keep her in the frame of the photos. And then suddenly I realized - my lens was all the way compacted into the body of the camera, and her face was STILL utterly filling the frame. I slowly lowered my camera. She was not a foot away from me, and still advancing. She actually RUBBED UP AGAINST THE SIDE OF THE VEHICLE. I could have reached my hand out and run it down her back without leaning forward at all. Gavin said very quietly to all of us, "everyone just stay very still and quiet. There's a good lion. Good lion. You're all right," and she walked slowly away.

(In the photo below you can see that she's turning to the left, to rub up against the car before walking away.)

I turned to Sandy's brother Clark, who had a video function on his camera, and whispered furiously, "please tell me you got that on video!!!" and he whispered back, "are you f*ing kidding me? I couldn't move! I couldn't even BREATHE."

But that wasn't the end of the excitement. She stalked majestically into the thicker brush, where we couldn't follow her. Gavin paced her to the very end of the field, and turned the car off again so that we could watch her wind her way through the brush. But when he went to start the vehicle up again, the battery didn't turn over the engine. He looked at the lioness, where she was just visible maybe 30 feet away, walking patiently across our field of view. He said, "just keep an eye on her, yeah?" to us, and hopped out of the jeep.

...

He popped the hood of the vehicle and fiddled with the battery leads while we all kept our eyes glued to the lioness, mouths very dry. She showed no interest in suddenly galloping towards us to eat Gavin, but we'd all been told so many times by our guides that putting feet on the ground changes the entire safari dynamic that had she done so, we would not have been surprised. He fixed whatever had been the problem, and the engine started. We quietly hurrahed, and followed her for a bit longer before giving her up and heading into a neighboring area, where we spotted some monkeys.

If you look closely at the photo above, you may also see an immature Bateleur's Eagle. (I think).

The fellow above was, as Gavin described him, "a very cheeky monkey."

We were driving along, with the other group in the vehicle behind us, and we stopped for a brief potty break at a Baobab tree.

You can see some elephant tusk damage done on the side - but Baobabs are the only tree that don't fall prey to debarking by elephants, not because the elephants don't try it, (clearly), but because the way a Baobab is structured means that it has no "bark" to speak of, and so doesn't suffer from the loss of its protection. They're spectacular.

There were some shenanigans during the potty break. The bug-resistant safari pants we'd all bought were...well let's just say that "flattering in shape" wasn't one of their strong points.

Ahem.

Moving right along, we traveled shortly in convoy, following the spoor of several lions on the road. As we were about to give them up as a lost cause, and Gavin had stopped the car and begun to put it into reverse to turn around and move to a different area, they came around the corner of a brush hedge to surprise us - it was two of the three slumbering males we'd seen the day before.

The other vehicle had rather more luck than we did, they were positioned very well for the lions to march right past them.

Gavin had started the car up and moved it before the second lion came around the hedge though, so we got much better shots of him.

After the lions, we drove to a pretty damp area. The other car was still with us...

When I say "damp"...

A Pied Kingfisher - one of the few that actually fishes!

They hover before diving down into the water to snatch a fish.

Above is an African Jacana! Below, a Monitor Lizard.

Three guesses. And if you guessed Lechwe, you were correct.

Hippo!

A small Nile Crocodile

And a mess of birds. There are African Open Bills below, and Cattle Egret...

A Cattle Egret

Below, the aptly-named Arrow Marked Babblers

We left the really wet area behind, and it was here that our path differed from the other vehicle's. They traveled to the left, along the side of the wet area, and we crossed it to reach the brushy ground beyond. One of us had spotted an Elephant.

He appeared to be pretty happily engaged in eating in the underbrush, but our presence annoyed him. He gave us a while to leave, but when we continued to sit there, he decided to move on himself.

As he came out of the bushes, we noticed that he was streaming, no - gushing - liquid from his sheath. Gavin muttered, "he's in must," under his breath, and started the vehicle to follow the bull. Must is the masculine equivalent of heat in females - it meant the elephant was a) ready for mating and b) really, really cranky.

He started to walk away from us, and we followed him.

He swung his head from side to side to keep an eye on us...

And then suddenly he decided that he'd had enough. He rapidly swung his entire body around to face us, whomping his great ears forward to display and swinging his trunk in a menacing parabola, trumpeting.

He was spoiling for a fight, but our vehicle did nothing but sit there. He considered this, and the red hormone rage left him, and he sort of drooped a bit. His body language appeared confused, and sort of apologetic. He seemed to be saying, "gee I'm sorry. I just...I feel so...I mean. I'm very frustrated!" We could see the anger draining right out of him. He stopped posturing, and his trunk fell to the ground. He groped around for a consolation snack.

We moved on - he'd put up with enough from us for one day. Finding ourselves in a wettish area again...we sent two Egyptian Geese winging away

A Lechwe resting...

And a Saddle Billed Stork.

And then through the wet and into the burn, where we found a really lovely zebra skull

and then the Zebra themselves!

And then it was back to camp for lunch and a break before the helicopter ride!