Thursday, 17 January 2013

15th & 16th Jan - Quiet times

Sohebele male enjoying a drink
 15.01.2013

Morning Drive
(Marka, Chad, Peter & Andrea)

Rhino (1 male)
Elephant (1 Kambaku) / Motswari – Western Cutline
Buffalo (Breeding Herd) / Mostwari – Just east of Shlaralumi camp

Afternoon Drive
(Peter)
X lots of rain

16.01.2012

Morning Drive
(Peter)

Leopard (Shindzuti male) / Peru – Sohobele Plains

Afternoon Drive
(Peter)

X even more rain

Well, if we thought it had rained yesterday – today it bucketed down! My seat was a pool of water, and despite my newly purchased rain jacket – I was drenched from head to toe.  I apologise therefore for lack of images this morning, but we could barely see more than 10m at one point, let along taking cameras out! We did get lucky when we bumped into a large male elephant who clearly did not mind the rain, and continued feeding along. Myself and Jacky were trying to find a herd of buffalo that we had seen some tracks for. But, the tracks had been before the late evening rain and discerning direction was difficult. We clearly took the wrong road, as once we were heading in the opposite direction, Peter found the herd in the area we had just come from. Tracking in the rain is not ideal. We got to view the nervous herd for a while, and the rain even lifted a little but soon it started up again and my guests were ready for home time. Chad had a successful morning as he found a male rhino resting up in a pool of water (as if there wasn’t enough falling form the sky!!!!). It looks like the rain is going to be staying with us for the next couple of days and I imagine the laundry ladies are not going to be too chuffed with our piles and piles of wet uniforms!

Peter has been out on his own the last few drives which has not been easy. Quite a few properties have closed due to the rain and there is no off road driving either which makes game viewing almost impossible (unless of course the animal is right next to the road). Looks like we are going to have even more rain over the weekend so hopefully the animals play along. Chad will be taking over the blog from tomorrow and for now,  hope you enjoy these pics I took a few weeks ago (when typically, I was not on blog duty) and the sun was still shining.






1 comment:

  1. Great photos Andrea... I think when one of you guys/girl are not on blog duty you still have to give your photos to the one that is on duty ;-)...

    Pity about all the rain, but don't complain too much otherwise you will be stuck with 40 degree days over there.
    I wish the rain could come to us a bit in Pretoria... There are clouds here at least.

    Cheers and thanks for all the updates.
    Lourens

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