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It was the first day of the new year and we planned to spend the whole day in the Park, driving much further South than we had so far gone. Sadly Louise was feeling ill and had to stay behind to await a doctor. The rest of us though were soon under way and this time we drove straight to the airfield and then on past the plain where last night we had admired the sunset. Almost immediately we saw a group of giraffe in the distance, their long necks bobbing up from behind the trees. The distance to them was however too great and the ground between us too uneven to allow a closer approach. It didn't matter. A few minutes later we came upon a solitary male. He was chewing at a tree top in a clearing and was no more than twenty feet away. Obligingly he posed for photographs.
Near the river we paused to stretch our legs and I spent a few minutes observing and sketching a tiny white spider that was too small to photograph. Later I identified it as one of the Salticidae, a jumping spider. Before we had set out Sarah and Sheila had complained about a rather bigger Arachnid that was sharing their cabin. That had been a large baboon spider, the African equivalent of a tarantula. Geoff had killed it with enough bug spray to fell an elephant which I thought was rather unjust. It wasn't actually hurting anybody after all.
When we continued David was continually asking for more giraffe. My facetious comment that I would be really impressed if Geoff could find us a kangaroo received the reaction it deserved. David's wish was soon granted. We came upon four giraffe together, a little way from the road but across an even grassy stretch of ground where we could drive closer. Not only was the group more interesting than the solitary male had been but the light was much better here for photography. We all snapped away happily, David especially so. When he was done he sheepishly confided that the reason he had so keenly wanted to find more was that for the first one he had had no film in his camera.
Our next encounter was more dramatic and had no time for pictures to be taken. We had been on a track skirting around a dried up river bed heading towards an area where we hoped to find lion. This led down through some fairly thick trees before emerging into a clearing. Of to one side, near an isolated stand of trees was an elephant, a large full grown male elephant. He trumpeted a warning and started a lumbering mock charge. We stopped. He stopped. Then he turned as if to go back into the trees. Without warning he wheeled around and with his ears flat and his trunk down he came thundering towards us in a charge that was anything but mock. Geoff slammed the Land Rover into reverse and took us back into the trees at very high speed. Satisfied that he had scared us off the elephant aborted his attack and followed us no further.
The next excitement came when Barry caught sight of two lion in the distance on the opposite bank of a tree filled valley which we had been following south. Geoff, who seemed to know every path and track in the park, tried to find a route round towards them but without success. We were on the verge of quitting when we found another lion, a female, resting in the shade of a tree and looking rather bored. She let us get within a few yards before yawning and walking off into the dense bush where we could not follow.
We were going to have a picnic lunch but before that we went to the South Lodge and cooled ourselves in their swimming pool and with a few beers. We could have eaten our picnic there but instead drove away and laid out our spread on the ground at the edge of a plain that had to be a mile or more wide. A herd of hundreds of impala and puku grazed on it and there were a few dozen zebra wandering about. It was another scene from my imagined Africa.
There was another Toyota stuck in the mud. We had come away from our lunch stop and started back North. Half a mile along the road was the Toyota. Unlike yesterday's encounter this one was accompanied by a number of mud splattered people , half of them desperately pushing and the other half desperately pulling. There was a logo for another tour operator painted on the door of the vehicle. Not only were these people clearly trying to help themselves but the chance to tow a rival operator out of the mud was one that Geoff couldn't resist. Having pulled them free we went on. Circling a tree in the distance were three vultures. Geoff steered us towards them. After half an hour of carefully manoeuvring the Land Rover between increasingly dense trees and bushes we were there. There were more vultures in a tree and a couple of hyena prowling about. Whatever was dead though we couldn't see, the undergrowth was just too thick. All the same something had died, the presence of so many scavengers proved it. We gave up trying to find it and continued on our way.
It was getting towards sunset now and we drove out onto a plain. In the distance was a herd of elephant that was much too large to consider approaching. There were more than twenty adults and perhaps a dozen juveniles and young. They seemed peaceful enough but there was also a hyena, slinking along behind them. Suddenly they caught his scent and we found out just why keeping clear was wise. As one the herd wheeled about and thundered towards the scavenger who took to his heels and fled into the bush. Even at this distance we could hear the thunder of their pursuit. It was magnificent and frightening.
By the time we reached the gate and left the park it was dark. We expected that there would be nothing more to see. We were mistaken. It was about a mile from the gate to the camp, mostly along roads similar to those in the park. Of course the park is a convenient fiction for the benefit of humans. The animals neither know nor care where it ends. As we approached the camp we turned a corner and there, right at the side of the road was a herd of giraffe. We stopped to watch them and more arrived, appearing as if by magic from the trees. At the end there were seventeen of them, the largest group we had seen and barely yards away. It was a stunning way to round off a perfect day.
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