Hi everyone. Ngaire turned the keyboard over to me yesterday, and I wrote a long report and the server went down. Today, I'm composing in WordPad, so I can save it first.
King's Camp was wonderful. The rooms were great, the food was excellent, and the service was also very good. Most importantly, we saw lots of animals: Lions (M&F), a leopard (I have a gorgeous picture), zebras, water buffalo, giraffes, impala and numerous other similar antelopes, lots of elephants, dozens of types of birds, a rhino, warthogs, and I'm sure more.
Yesterday, we took the short plane trip over to Leopard Hills. The place is gorgeous. We are less than 100 km from King's Camp, but it is much greener here. (I've taken pictures of our "rooms" at both Camps.) Yesterday, as I think Ngaire told you, we had an amazing experience in the evening when we saw a female leopard and her two cubs (I think they were about 1 1/2 years old). Mom had killed an impala yesterday, and dragged it up in a tree, and the three of them were going to be around it until they were through with it. They weren't actually eating while we were there. The ranger said it is very rare to see three leopards at a sighting. I found it very difficult to get good shots at night, but have a few that may be okay; we'll see what Ken ends up with. We also went to a place overlooking a huge watering hole and saw a huge crock on the bank and hippos in the water--though they were very far away. Glad I have a 12x zoom.
I have been really happy with my Panasonic FZ-20 (and I see they just came out with an FZ-50!). For those, who don't want to deal with an SLR, this camera is hard to beat.
Meanwhiile, our room here is very high up and there is a large watering hole not too far away. The view is spectacular. We've seen warthogs out there, wildabeasts (sp?), antelope, and today a herd of elephants came buy to splash around and drink and then move on. You can see all this from the bathtub!
The food here is been very, very good. At the BOMA last night we had sort of a Mongolian pot stir fry where you picked your ingredients, including ostrich and/or chicken. Also, ribs and oxtail stew, as well as numerous vegetables. (Drank too much wine without knowing it and suffered this morning. Sounds like being on a ship.)
Today we stalked another leopard, and we have some great shots. It took a long time to track her down after the initial sighting. I think this afternoon we're going to be looking for a large pride of lions. I still don't have great shots of a male lion, and some of us have yet to see hyenas, though they're all around.
Well, we're off to lunch soon. Several couples, including Ken and Ngaire, went on a helicopter excursion to a canyon, which was postponed earlier. Again, I intend to write a more detailed, chronological report some time when I'm back. I really don't want to go to work. I just want to work on my pictures and the report.
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Eugene
