Day 8 - South Africa - Elephant Plains

We woke up at 5:30am to our "wake-up knock" (no phone for a call) and headed directly to the Land Rover for our morning drive. Everyone was groggy, but eager to find out what the wildlife was up to. Eco-tourists going on these safaris typically hope to see the "big 5": elephant, rhino, lion, leopard, buffalo. Add to that your cheetah and wild dog (both much rarer in the Sabi Sand reserve) and you've got your "big 7".

Spotted a few large birds sitting in a tree silhouetted by the rising sun. I don't remember what kind these were. In fact, there were many times on the drives where I should have been writing down species and interesting wildlife tidbits given that Richard was narrating as we drove along. I was too enthralled to think of it at the time though.


Birds of prey were commonly seen perched on branches with an eye out for the slightest movement of their next meal. I never saw one swoop in for a kill though.


Saw a few zebra grazing along the side of the road.


The fun part of this particular drive, though, was watching the elephant herd stomping around, eating, knocking over trees, etc.


The babies were especially cute.


Sometimes the elephants would come quite close to the Land Rovers. If they felt threatened by us, they would flap out their ears to make them seem even bigger in hopes of intimidating us. When they realized we weren't scared, they simply turned around and ignored us. Generally, animals will try intimidation and avoid resorting to a physical fight (unless they see you as food I guess.)

When the babies try to be intimidating, they get even cuter.
After watching the elephants for a long while we stopped for some tea.
After a little more driving, we headed back to the lodge and had a little breakfast. Then we went on the bush-walk. Walking around, everything suddenly seems bigger than when you are in the Land Rover. The termite mounds, for instance, are massive (and they are pretty much everywhere.) As I understand it, two-thirds of the maze of tunnels that make up the dwelling is underground.
A close-encounter with some warthogs was the highlight of this walk. Ming was struck by how much warthogs really do look like Pumba from the Lion King. It was a comment that I heard two or three other visitors make. I realized, that the poor rangers must get tired of hearing that all the time... it was all I could do to keep Ming from bursting out into a verse of "Hakuna Matata." (ahem, I would like to chime in here that Ian was actually the one who eventually started singing the words to the song).


We headed back to the lodge, and I zonked out for a couple of hours before our 2:00pm lunch Ming went to the gym and worked out... I don't know where she gets the energy.


After lunch (which seemed to consist of similar food every day... kinda reminded Ming of summer camp), we set out for our afternoon drive. We came upon a lone buffalo at a waterhole, which stared at us for a looong time before ambling off.


Next we spotted our first giraffe. Richard explained that by some unknown natural phenomenon... once you have broken the first-giraffe-spotting barrier, you tend to see them everywhere. He was right.


We even saw a baby...


They are such strange animals...


Squirrel sightings were also quite common.


We saw Salayexe again on this drive. She was Richard's favorite of the 15 (or so) leopards in the Sabi Sand Reserve, so he liked to check up on her. Here's a shot to prove I was just a few meters away!

She was resting...

Never disturb your mother while she is resting...


The Land Rovers were often followed by these relatively small black birds which flitted from treetop to treetop as we lumbered along like a four-wheeled elephant. They follow the larger animals around the bush so that they might feast on the insects, which often accompany the slower beasts as they plod along.

As the sun was setting we ate pickles and cheese (an odd combination I must say) and had our sundowners. Before heading back to the lodge, though, we tracked down the fourth of our big 5 (having seen leopard, buffalo and elephants already.)

The pride was asleep. From what Richard was saying, it's not uncommon for these cats to sleep for 20 hours a day. To cool themselves, they'll raise their paws in the air. Doesn't it look like an oversized house-cat just itching to have its belly rubbed.


As night fell, they began to stir.


But they always looked half asleep.

So much for the king of beasts.


We let the lazy cats be and drove back to the game lodge. We had dinner outside around a nice fire and the occupants of each Land Rover (there are three that go out each time) told stories of their sightings.