Animals at the Pan

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Geo: -24.7435, 26.2573

This evening we had no guests, so I went with Paul for a drive to pick up staff from one of the gates. On the way out of the lodge, we stopped in the wetlands to briefly watch some water buck. The water buck were enjoying standing knee deep in the mud, drinking and eating water grasses. We continued on and about thirty minutes later came to Vlei Pan - out of the best waterholes to see animals at.

At that moment there were only wildebeest at the pan. We didn't want to stop just for wildebeest. A few kilometres along the road there was a rotting carcass of a giraffe that was killed a few days ago by a lion. As we quietly approached the carcass (which was just off the main road) a couple of jackals and a brown hyena quickly walked away. The carcass stank, so we drove away.
For the next hour we didn't see anything until we came to Vlei Pan again on the way back to the lodge.

This time there was a young giraffe, a small breeding herd of elephants, a rhino mother and her calf and a few various birds. We saw here for a while and watched the rhinos, who just stood there and watched us and they frequently turned their heads to observe their surroundings. The elephants came very close to our vehicle as they walked past. We then headed back to the lodge.

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Photos

01 Waterbuck
Lots of water buck in the wetlands.

02 Wildebeest
Wildebeest near Vlei Pan - having just had a drink.

03 Rhinos
A mother rhino and her cute little calf.

04 Elephant & Rhino
A female elephant walking past the rhino mother and calf.

05 Elephants
Part of a small breeding herd of elephants walking past the pan.

06 Giraffe
A giraffe bending down to drink.

08 Closer
A mother and her calf coming closer to our vehicle.

09 Walking
The mother and her calf are about to walk past us.

10 Rhinos
The mother rhino's horn is very pointy.