Theme of the Day:The Big 5!!!!
Word of the Day:Boma
Boma is an enclosure.
We were up at 4:45 AM. Our Wake Up Call was at 5 AM. You all know that I am not a morning person (yes I'm a night owl). You can see by the picture that I am actually wide awake and I'm smiling. That's because it was time for our first morning Safari!!!!
"Masambene Baantu!"
We loaded onto the Safari Vehicles and began our first Safari morning game drive. We did pause to watch the sunrise at 6:07 AM.
After seeing a few Zebras we started our "job" of tracking the Big Five. The Big Five includes:
1. Buffalo.
2. Elephants
3. White Rhino
4. Lions (and Lioness)
5. Leopards.
The Big Five get their name from their ability to kill man. Meaning if you do not kill them with your first shot, they are going to get You!! Not to worry though, we were not out to hunt them. This is a Disney Adventure after all. We were there to observe, photograph and video them, nothing more!!!!
The first of the Big Five that we found was the Buffalo. Frikkie kept our Safari Vehicle on the road and a safe distance from the Buffalo. John used his long range lens to get some great close up pics.
When the Buffalo moved on we started to track the Elephants. Elephants are not hard to find as when they feed on the trees they leave branches strewn on the road. It did not take us long to find the Elephants.
This was another OMG moment!!!!! I was so excited when we came up to the Elephants!!!! We watched them feed for over ten minutes. The Elephants were tearing the branches off of the trees for the leaves. One of the Elephants pushed one of the trees over!! That was pretty interesting to watch. Frikkie said that he had never seen a group of Elephants so relaxed with humans that close. We were so excited to see the baby Elephants play!!!
After watching the Elephants feed and play it was time for a break. By that time the second cup of coffee that we had at 5:30 in the morning needed to exit. Hand sanitizer is essential in the bush!
After our little foray into the bush it was time for some photos.
When our break was done it was time to go back to our Safari. Things relaxed a bit as we had already found two of The Big Five.
We arrived back at the Lodge mid morning. It was time for a scrumptious Breakfast!! It's amazing how big of an appetite we worked up when we were on Safari! Lumbeleh!!! (Lumbeleh now happens to be my favorite word!!!!)
We went back to the room for a just a bit. We then came back to the main area for our Archery lesson by the pool.
Our Archery teacher was National Champion Roelf Swanepoel. Archery reminded me of going out to shoot at the range with my Dad when I was in High School. After a few practice shots we had a contest. Each one of us had three shots. I got one Bulls Eye and one arrow landed in the black part of the circle. I won the archery contest for the gals and Kereth won for the guys. Roelf posed for a picture with Kereth and I after the contest.
Then it was time for Roelf to show off and show us what he could do. Wow!!!!!
We also had some fun learning how to throw spears.
After our Archery and Spear Toss Lessons we went to bead with Queen Motsatsi. The women beaded while the guys sat around and visited.
After beading Tina and Lizzie went into the pool to cool off. It was really hot that day!!!
We went to Lunch and then headed back to our room for a break. At 4 pm we were back on the Safari Vehicles for our Sundown Game Drive.
See how this Giraffe's right horn is missing. Frikkie said that this male Giraffe had most likely lost his horn during a fight with another male Giraffe. (Boys will be boys!)
After a short while of driving around we were back to tracking The Big Five. This time we were looking for the White Rhino. Driving around the Reserve reminded me of driving around my Cousins' farms back home. Only we do not have Zebras, Giraffes in Seward or Valparaiso!
Driving around that evening I felt like this was exactly what I was supposed to be doing right here right now at this very moment. The best words to explain how I felt that night come from the Lion King's song Can You Feel the Love Tonight "Can you feel the love tonight? The peace that evening brings. The world for once in perfect harmony with all it's living things."
We had been tracking the White Rhino for over an hour without success. Then Kereth saw them way back in the bush. We went "around the block" to try and get a closer look at them. We were no closer to the Rhino then we were before.
The Game Guides and the Spotters had a discussion on what to do next. The Spotters decided to go upwind into the bush. The Spotters knew that the Rhino would smell them. The hope was that the Rhino would then move away from the scent of the Spotters and go towards the road.
All of the Adult Adventurers in our Safari vehicle were saying "No way I would do that. I would get killed." Frikke reminded us that our Spotters did this for a living. Tracking and spotting animals was in their blood. They had grown up in villages where there was no TV or IPods. Because of this they had learned to live with the land.
Livestock was precious to the Spotters families. A cow was equivalent to a owning a Ferrari. If a family cow became lost the Spotters would have to go find it. They could not come back to the village until the cow had been found.
We were relieved to hear that the Spotters knew what they were doing. The Spotters moved upwind close to the Rhino but not too close. They knew how close they could get without being charged by the Rhinos. Their plan worked. Within minutes the Rhino moved close to the road where our Safari Vehicles were parked.
In the first Rhino picture the one on the right is the male. The other three are females. I thought one of the lady Rhinos looked pregnant. Frikkie looked and said that she could be.
After watching and photographing the Rhinos for some time we headed out to go track the lions. When I say Lions I mean the Lionesses. Lion is easier to say and type. We drove around for a while and came upon four Lions in the road. By the way they were walking we could see that they were in attack formation and on the prowl for food. They were communicating with each other by ear and tail signals. They headed off into the bush. We lost them for a while but then our Spotter tracked their location. We pulled off the road into the bush!!!! We all thought this was so cool when the Safari Vehicle would pull off the road into the bush-it felt so much like we were on Safari!!!
Both of our Safari Vehicles pulled up near to a tree line. Frikkie and our Spotter knew that there was many Impala in the trees up ahead. They have developed night vision and can see a lot more than we could. The Lions were crouched in attack formation. Three of them were strategically up front near the Impala and waiting to strike. The lead Lion was behind them orchestrating it all. Per Frikkie, she uses ear and tail signals to tell the others which Impala to go after.
It was quiet for a little bit. The darkness folded in on our Safari Vehicles. We did have a sliver of light from the full moon. Every once in a while the Spotter would shine the headlight on the lead Lion. He did not shine the light on the Impala as 1) this would show the Lions exactly where they were and 2) the Impala would be blinded by the light which would be unfair to him or her. Remember we are there to observe and not change the behavior of the animals.
We could hear the Impala send out a distress call to each other. This went from the left to the right side of the tree line. The Impala were warning each other that the Lions were there. The night became just a bit eerie at that point.
We waited for a while and nothing happened. The tension continued to mount. It was as if the darkness was pressing up against us.
And suddenly all havoc broke loose. An Impala came running out of the woods and ran right by the left side of our Safari Vehicle. I expected one of the Lions to be not far behind but the night was again silent. All the women in our Safari Vehicle were hanging onto to each other and saying "OMG, OMG." I could feel and hear my heart beating fast in the black and now not so still night.
After about a minute a Wildebeest came crashing out of the tree line in the back of us and to our left. He ran past the back of our Safari Vehicle and over to a tree that was behind the other Safari Vehicle. Suddenly from what seemed like no where the lion took the Wildebeest down!!!!! The Wildebeest did not stay down for long though, he ran off into the bush.
Wildebeest happens to be like Caviar to the Lions. After a bit we drove over to the other Safari Vehicle and the tree where the Wildebeest had temporarily gone down. The Lion that had made the chase was by the side of the road. She was panting and breathing hard. The lead Lion was right in front of us. She had fire in her eyes!!!! She was really upset that the kill had not been made. "Time to go!" Frikkie said. She would most likely not of bothered us but we did not stay around to find out.
Wow! We had just been int he middle of a lion chase!!!! Frikkie said that Lions were only 43% successful when the went for a kill. Often it takes them a night or two to get their prey.
We came back to the Lodge that night raving about the Lion chase!! We all knew that we were extremely lucky to have observed the Lion chase that night!!!
We walked over to the Rhino Boma to make Pizzas. Remember that Boma was the word for the day. Boma means enclosure. We had a blast making the Pizzas that night. The Game Guides also showed us how to make "pigs in a blanket." They had a special name for this but I can not remember what it was.
Oh what a day! After our Pizza dinner we were ready for bed!! Not our Guides though. Tina and Craig took Ryan and Lizzie down to the Snake Pit to watch the Lion King.
John snapped some cool night time shots of the lobby on our way to our room. Kapama Lodge is absolutely beautiful!!! It not only met our expectations of how a Safari Lodge should be, it way exceeded them!!!! The pictures on their website do not do the Lodge justice. We recommend that you go see the Lodge for yourself.
We were off to our room. I was half asleep at about 10:30 PM (remember that we had go up at 4:45 AM). John was out on the balcony listening to the night. He came back into the room and said that he had heard a Lion roar!!! I was not really awake so I was not believing him. He then opened our balcony doors. In a few minutes I could hear the male Lion ROAR. We could tell that the Lion was far away but still it was just slightly scary. I asked John to shut the door and come inside.
We were off to Disney Dreams!!!
Next Up: The Day of the Leopard!
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