Following on from yesterday’s game drive we had an early start for our next game drive. In the mornings in the National Park it is more likely to find some big cats. The main attraction here is the elephants though. Many of the elephants that now live in this district originally came from Angola that was wracked by 27 years of civil war from 1975-2002. Cuban and Russian soldiers fought on the side of the government, while South African forces covertly supported by the USA supported the anti-communist rebel army. Like most countries in southern Africa, unemployment remains high, but the signs are good as inflation continues to fall. All of this means that the elephant population is 3-4 times higher that it should be and this has quite devastating effects on the vegetation. On the up side it is fascinating to observe the family structures within the elephant herds. Each family group has a Matriarch. The male bull elephant doesn’t live with the herd and all the sisters and aunties bring up the young ones.
After taking one of the back roads in a unsuccessful hunt for big cats we came across a lioness sleeping in the sun. She was around ten metres from the car and there were many other safari vehicles observing her. The behaviour was mostly good and eventually she raised her head to look around. She wasn’t bothered by and seemed to stay long enough to pose for photos.
We started making our way back to the lodge for for lunch, but happened upon the clean up crew getting to work on an abandoned meal. We saw a rare brown hyena close by and then some spotted hyenas, jackals and the usual bird suspects, the vultures.
Later in the afternoon our guide put us on a boat and we poked around the channels of the Chobe wetland. This is an area where the Chobe River spreads out prior to its confluence with the Zambezi. The other side of the river is in Namibia. There is a rich array of water birds, including darters, cormorants, ducks and the apex bird the fish eagle, who incidentally eats birds as well as fish. The female fish eagle is almost twice the size of the male, so makes a formidable hunter.
Herds of buffalo are seen here as well, so we have now been able to tick off all of the Big Five. We also saw some hippos and some quite large crocodiles. It is advisable not to swim in these parts. We stayed on the boat until the light faded, providing yet another red sunset to go with our sundowners.
Until tomorrow…
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