1st June 2012 – Stay at Olifants Camp

1st June 2012 – Stay at Olifants Camp

We woke up early today so we got up and left our room at 5.30am – despite not being able to leave camp until 6am. We decided to just sit and wait at the gate for 30 minutes as when we had arrived at the gate the morning before we were surprised how many cars were already there waiting to go. To our surprise we weren’t the first ones there – one other car was already waiting. While we waited we set up our camera ready to take photos in the low early morning light and 5 minutes later Wayne spotted something move next to the camp gate, I turned on our lights and to our amazements it was a wild cat! Unbelievable! Wayne jumped out of the car to take a few photos as it walked towards the gate before sliding underneath it and into the darkness. Unfortunately because it was still so dark our photos (evidence) didn’t come out but it was still a great sighting – this must be a good omen for the day ahead! So at 6am we left camp and headed towards the lion carcass to see what the latest was on it! On our way there, about 4km from camp we could not believe our eyes as a civet ran out in front of us and crossed the road before hiding in the long grass!

Blimey this was a good morning – for sightings but not for photographs. Cleverly we had stored the GPS location of the lion carcass in our Sat Nav so we could easily find the carcass in the dark (a trick we used several times in our trips for thing like hyena dens etc.). At the lion carcass there were 2 spotted hyenas and a black backed jackal. We were surprised that there were not more scavengers around and how much of the carcass remained. We speculated that because it is a carnivore, fewer scavengers would want to eat it – this is just a guess. We stopped and watched the hyenas tugging and rolling on the carcass for about 15 minutes before they ran off. We don’t know why they would want to roll on it – I think we need to do some more reading on animal behaviour. Upon closer inspection it looked like the carcass may have been slightly burnt. This surprised us and if the park rangers had done this, why hadn’t they burnt it completely? We guessed that maybe they had done this because it had TB and in burning it would mean that the animals would be less likely to eat it.

We left the carcass and drove along the H6 where we had seen the bateleur eagle eat the rabbit. It wasn’t long before Wayne saw some spotted hyenas at the side of the road – less that 1m from us. We counted them to confirm that there were 8 in total; 3 juveniles and one very pregnant mum with a young hyena still suckling from her. They were so sleepy and only raised their heads when some impala ran past so they didn’t run off when we parked up alongside them to watch. One woke up to go to the loo but was so sleepy that it fell asleep whilst still mid-flow! Quite amusing! We thought that this must be where their den was due to them being so relaxed and the number of footprints around.

Along this road we also saw elephant, wildebeest, impala, giraffe and another young hyena making it our eleventh for the day! I think today is definitely hyena spotting day!

We stopped off at N’wanetsi Picnic Spot to go to the loo and admire the view – apparently the only place to have a better view is Olifants – we will be able to confirm that in a few hours!

After leaving here we drove back along the S100 which is well known for big cat sightings; we had already driven along it several times and not had the much luck (although we hadn’t driven it first thing in the morning or last thing in the afternoon). Along that way I remembered that we hadn’t taken our malaria tablets. Wayne got them out and got the water ready too. He took a gulp of the water and I then put my hand out for him to give me my tablet; it was at the moment that Wayne said “oh, I’ve had two”! What a Wally! I had mine but Wayne said he will just have to go short on the last day of the trip but at least he won’t get malaria today!

Along the S100 we did see a lioness. She crossed the road in front of us clearly having just drunk at the river as she had a very wet chin.

We also saw a lone buffalo, a large bull elephant with fairly big tusks as well as warthogs, impala and zebra.

When we got to the end of the S100 we drove back to the lion carcass which was just 6km away to see if the vultures had arrived yet. Still nothing. We didn’t wait around as we had yesterday. We drove further along the road to the Nsemani Dam where we saw some hippos eating on the edge of the dam as well as impala and zebra. Just as we were about to leave we saw a lioness come towards the zebras, crouched down stalking them! She went to chase them but they had already spotted her and so ran before she had time to catch one. We didn’t see her again as she had chased them into the bushes. This was our third sighting of a lioness attempting to catch prey; amazing!

We then headed up to Olifants. The road was pretty quiet; both with cars and wildlife! On our drive we did see lots of cars parked on a road adjacent to ours so we did a quick U-turn and went to see what they were looking at – at least 4 lionesses asleep around 70m from the road. They were all passed out in the heat of the day (it was 11.45am) so after watching them for 15 minutes we decided to head on.

Further along the road we also saw a herd of several hundred zebras; they were as far as the eye could see and on both sides of the road! There was the odd wildebeest in the herd too. Apart from that I don’t think we saw anything else on our drive to Olifants accept a few giraffes.

At Olifants we saw some hippos, elephants and Wayne saw some impala on the other side of the river. All this was whilst having lunch in the restaurant and admiring the river view which really was spectacular. At 2pm we checked into our room and were delighted to have a river view. We spent the afternoon watching what animals came to the river from our patio. This included a herd of 10 elephants of all ages as well as a herd of giraffes, a male kudu and a pair of bush buck. All this was from our room. We were very surprised to see so much wildlife in such a short space of time and it was nice to be able to watch all this from our room/patio.

That evening we made supper, had a few drinks and watched the river. We ended up spending most of the evening trying to photograph a bat that kept coming in to eat moths on our patio light. We went through 2 memory cards trying to catch him on camera! He’s so quick that most of our photos are just of the wall and then when we did capture him he wasn’t in focus! Very frustrating! It was a lovely end to what was a quiet afternoon and one I think we will probably repeat tomorrow.