Comings, goings-on, greetings and meetings

Whew! Another wonderful day in Africa. We hopped up on the range rover at 6:05 am (I was a little slow on eating the muffin without Jake the not-so-wild dog). We drove right into a mixture of cape buffalo (herd #2) and elephants. Elephants evidently planned a region wide get-together, as they were pouring into one patch in the King's Camp concession.

Our Timbavati Twosome did NOT manage to pick off the duggar boy (or any other cape buffalo) overnight. They headed over to the Kruger Park about 50 km from where we saw them. Patrick did a yeoman's job of filling in our species sighted forms. He found tracks from a different group of lions (2 lionesses and 3 subadults as we say in the savanna ). Nyala (a couple of really handsome ones at that), a two generation Kudu family, hippos from a more than safe distance, and the best of the available animals species along our route.

the call came through - the King's Camp resident leopardess was hanging out for adulation and endless digital records of her morning in the bush. We drew nearer to the location and crashed our way through the vegetation. There she was .. in all her glory. My very best picture of the entire stay was the last one .. as she shot down the tree in search of a tasty lunch.

We headed back for breakfast and ran into Johannes, our former night watchman turned waiter. He started calling off room numbers as he gathered our breakfast orders. It was time for last showers, final packing, final photo backups and then time to leave our wonderful spot at King's Camp.

I headed up to settle up our incidentals bill. We had a very welcome and rare sighting in camp .. the BK trio. Ngaire, Ralph Webster and Ken were heading over to view the honeymoon suite. How about that? How nice of them to come see us off to our next African safari home We gave 'em the down low (as the kids say these days) on King's Camp and headed off to the airstrip.

On the way, we were treated to a Bateleur eagle send off and, the rock star of African birding, Miss Botswana (lilac breasted roller) in full wing as her super saturated colors shimmered in the lovely day.

Our sixteen minute flight was in our favorite African bush plane, the Caravan. Ralph, you left your ticket to Leopard Hills in the plane along with some uneaten bread

Our pilot and copilot guided us into Djuma, where Texan our guide met our very own native Texan, Michele. We boarded the Toyota Land Cruisers for transport to Vuyatela. We checked off warthogs and wildebeests on the way back. it is hotter here so we were glad to see camp.

Unlike King's Camp, this is authentic African themed vs. British Colonial. Open air seats await; and the animals (except the elephants) walk freely through camp. We are mesmerized by this place. We got the quick tour and settled into watching wildlife from our deck. I dunked my feet in the plunge pool to cool off. Hippos were giving the Grey Heron a free ride and elephants were massing near the mud hole. Cape buffalo are lowing and the impala and water bucks are on the other side of our room.

the footprint on the rooms is huge .. separate reception room, bedroom, desk area, closet, safe, separate toilet area, double sinks, indoor bath and outdoor shower. Two loungers for enjoying the wildlife show and a side chair. Geez .. this is bigger than the ground floor of my home!

We especially enjoyed getting to know Lisha and Warren Moore a bit better. it turns out their children are attending a local 'school for the planet' so they get a standard and local bush education at the same time. The other day had the wild dog pack hunting impala throughout the school grounds. Umm .. if we don't find good stuff here, we're volunteering to teach as guest speakers on practical matters if that's what it takes to see a wild dog kill.

It's time to clean up, put our laundry order together and head up to super tea before we head out for more game drives.

cheers, Anne