DAY 118---SAFARI (DAY 3)

 

        This is a cheetah.  Lighting show last night but today is a beautiful sunny day.  Enjoying it after 2 days of clouds.

TODAY

        Another 5:30 wake up call and meeting for a quick coffee before we began the game drive.  It was just daylight and sun was still coming up over a cloud bank in the east but the clouds disappeared soon after.  Very pleasant temperature for the morning drive.

        Our driver and guide soon spotted an impala running high speed so they surmised there may be a predador close by.  Sure enough they found two leopards lying in the bushes.  You may pick out his head and body. 

She finally came out to say hello to us.  Below are 4 more leopard photos.

                          Hippos back in the water after spending the night out eating.

                                                                             Heron

       Zebra waking down the road.  They like to walk on the roads as the grass has ticks.

           What a morning!!  Next we came upon a cheetah.  She was dining on a rabbit.

                                                       Cheetahs are the fastest animal.

           OOPS!  No wonder we had a flat tire with all the stuff we had been driving through.  

        The tire tool on the truck did not fit the lug nuts so they had to call the shop to bring one out.  Luckily, we were close to it.  I asked if they called AAA.

                                                The AAA guy getting back in his vehicle.

                                                    While changing the tire we had coffee.

        Bongani, our tracker, sits on the front.  When he gets down and sits inside we know there may be dangerous animals around.  Lucky is our guide/driver.  It is a 4 wheel drive Toyota Land Rover.  Like to know how much it cost.

                                                            Some elephant bones.

                                         This is a cape buffalo, one of the big 5 games.

                                                   There were several lying in the grass.

                             The some of the bark had been rubbed off by elephant tusks.

                         Next we saw some female lions walking down the road towards us.

                                   They walked right by our vehicle.  Looked up to say hello.

                                                  Then they lied down here in the shade.

                                       Holly brought the rest of our gang over to see the lions.

                                           They finally got up and walked past us again.

                                                                Our lodge in the brush.

        This morning's drive was amazing as we finished seeing the Big 5 South African animals:  Rhinoceros, Elephant, Lion, Cape Buffalo, Leopard.  Besides them it was neat seeing the 

cheetah this morning.  Our last drive will be after lunch today.  It is very hot with lots of sun now.

                                                           Back by 9:30 for breakfast.

       I had the English breakfast:  Scrambled eggs, sausage, bacon, mushrooms, sauteed onions.

        After 10 the Davis's and Marge went to the Zulu village for a tour there.  Think it cost over $100 per person so the rest of the group was not interested.  Jane, Melissa, and Rebecca talked and talked and talked.  I worked on this post.  The wifi went down for nearly an hour which frustrated me.

                                          For lunch we had the avocado & artichoke salad. 

        For my entree I had to try the impala chop.  It was delicious!!  Ok, about to leave on our final game drive.  I will go ahead and publish this now.  Otherwise there will be too many photos and you would lose interest before finishing the post.

        Lucky and Holly have been invited to join us for dinner tonight.  I asked Lucky to be back from the drive by 6pm so we could get cleaned up and have some pre-dinner drinks.

        We will be leaving here tomorrow morning at 8:30 for our 4 hour drive to Durban.  YUK!