On Safari With Curtis 14 March 2015

14 March 2015

This morning we set out early with high hopes and those hopes were fulfilled!!!

We had plenty of sightings with so many of them in close proximity to the vehicle.

Choosing two highlights is fairly difficult today but I decided on these two.

The first was the first of four sightings of rhino, we found three adult males grazing alongside the road not at all disturbed by the cars. They were in nice open area as well which gave us a great opportunity for some lovely photos.

The second highlight was a trio of adult male lions. On arrival two of them were out in the open just a few meters from the road and so we were able to get some great photos. Every now and again one would start to lick his paw and give its face a clean or perhaps give a nice big yawn showing off some pretty impressive canines.

Such was our luck today I am going to cheat a bit and share a third highlight. We had heard about a cheetah sighting early in the morning but had decided to go to the lion sighting first and try our luck later with the cheetah.

So after a very late breakfast we headed to where the cheetah had been seen and we were in luck as the cheetah was still there. It was sitting up in the shade of a tree some hundred meters or so away and so even with binoculars it was hard to get a good look.

A few minutes later everything changed as shortly after the only other vehicle at the sighting moved away the cheetah started to move. We turned around and tried to follow it's path as she edged closer to the road and us. We lost visual for a minute or so but working on her direction we moved to where she might come out of the bush and then we saw her. Just thirty meters from us and still moving towards us. Every now and again she would stop and look behind and it became apparent why as two little cubs appeared out of the tall grass. We stopped the car and waited as mum and cubs walked ever closer and eventually crossed over the road in front of us before disappearing in the tall grass in the blink of an eye.

Also seen today two leopard sightings, hyena, and a huge bull elephant all right next to the mova as well as lots of impala, nyala, bushbuck, vervets, warthog, kudu, giraffe, waterbuck, wildebeest, steenbok, leopard tortoise, buffalo and hippo.

Birds seen include egyptian geese, blacksmith lapwings, white breasted cormorants, wooly necked storks, yellow-billed and red-billed hornbills, grey go-away birds, cape glossy starlings, saddle billed stork, tawny eagle and many more.