We got another 5:30 wake up call, but the early hour didn’t bother me a bit since I was so excited about the coming day. At 6 we had the usual coffee and muffins and started the drive at 6:15. The view over the area with the sun coming up was amazing. We started off by seeing the ubiquitous guinea fowl and a bateleur eagle and a Walberg’s eagle. I am so glad for my new camera. The zoom is awesome, and my photos impress even me! We came across a tribe of vervet monkeys in a jackalberry tree jumping and playing. Then we saw a martial eagle high up in a tree. Then came francolin, giraffe, more lilac-breasted rollers, and steenbok. Word came that cheetah were spotted heading toward Kruger Park, and we had a wild ride in the truck to try and see them before they crossed over into Kruger since we could not follow them there. Poor Linda and Barbara (there were two Barbara’s on this trip) almost got bounced out of the truck since they were high up on the last bench. Alas, we did not make it in time, but the ride was certainly something to remember.
We did see a large herd of zebra and wildebeest. One of the zebras had an unusual white tail. There were more giraffe, a large elephant, another yellow-billed hornbill, and a lovely magpie shrike.
We arrived back in camp at 9 where we went back to the room to pack up. We had a large breakfast at 9:30 and at 10:15 we went back to the airfield where Max and his co-pilot Phillip were waiting to whisk us away at 11. We stopped at Polokwane Airport to have our passports stamped as we were leaving South Africa on our way to Botswana. We had to pay a fee not to have to take our luggage off the airplanes to be inspected, and were off again at 12:15.
We arrived at the Limpopo Valley Airport at 1pm. We filled out our Botswana immigration forms and took a 45 minute drive to Mashatu Main Camp. We were greeted with a welcome passion fruit drink. After checking in, we had tea – spinach pastry, sandwiches, lemon meringue, and cookies.
Mashatu is a very different area – large open spaces, sort of ‘out of Africa’ scenery. We left on our afternoon drive at 3:30. Our drivers and trackers were a great group of guys. Dix and Dan were the drivers and Aaron was our tracker. We saw a large group of elephant and zebra in the distance. Then there were lots of impala, a mashatu tree, a shepherd tree which had a strange odor. Many of the trees have beautiful weaver’s nests in them on the west side of the tree. I finally got to see my first group of red-billed quelea. These flocks can number in the thousands and do horrendous damage to the crops in Africa. But they are an awesome sight to see as they land and take off as a large group.
We saw lots of giraffe, a quick glance at a black-backed jackal, zebra, white-fronted bee-eater (another beautiful bird), hyena, more lions – this time with a couple of cute healthy looking cubs, guinea fowl, a kori bustard, and a couple of cheetas – our first ones!
We were back at camp at 7, rested for a while, and then had dinner at 8 in the Mashatu boma: potato/leek/pear soup, lamb or beef curry with rice, peas, grilled potatoes, veggies in a sauce, salad, coffee, apple crisp with cream. We were certainly fed well throughout the trip, but I would have liked a few more local items.
We were in bed by 9:30. And yet another amazing day!!!
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment