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Published: June 17th 2017
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02 Approaching
An elephant approaching the lake. Geo: -16.8703, 28.5864
Again I started the day by sleeping in, there was no rush to get out of the tent. The weather started off being cloudy – this was a nice relief from the previous day's weather of high heat. Unfortunately the cool weather didn't last long, as it was back to a clear, sunny sky with the temperature increasing.
Once I got out of the tent, I enjoyed a large Amarula coffee and two tomato, cheese and onion jaffles, while sitting on the shore of the lake. We then spent a bit of time repacking and tidying up our cars, as we were back on the road very early tomorrow morning. We also had to make sure that they are monkey proof. We have heard stories that the monkeys are really bad at our next destination of Mana Pools. While we were repacking, two impalas ran through the camp ground, unfortunately there was nothing chasing them.
I then got comfortable in my chair, under the shade, put music on, read some magazines and enjoyed some chilled ciders. Occasionally I looked up and around to see if there was any wildlife in sight. The only thing I saw was a couple of
03 Elephant
Behind the bushes is the elephant slowly walking to the water. baboons. Once they noticed me, they ran away. I also saw a bull elephant drinking water, about 200m along the shore. I gathered my camera and video camera and slowly walked towards the elephant. I kept my distance to about 100m and was too scared to get any closer. The elephant didn't seem to have noticed me. A few minutes later it walked back into the bush.
I got back into my chair and continued enjoying the serenity. About two hours later, another elephant appeared in the same place as the previous elephant. It happily drank water as it stood in the water. Paul and I walked closer to watch the elephant. I was hesitant to get too close, despite Paul's gentle persuasion. I hid behind a fallen down tree. Along came a second bull elephant, it looked towards us, raised his trunk to smell us, flapped his ears and then interacted with the other elephant. Both elephants began to playfully fight with their long tusks. It was a great sighting. I could hear the sound of their tusks hitting each other. At this stage we were so close to the huge, powerful creatures. I hoped that they would not
04 One Side
Looking out at one side of the lake. be bothered by our close presence. They then walked back into the bush. We were only there for 20 minutes, but it seemed like so much longer.
We then walked back towards our campsite. I was looking forward to some shade- we were in full sun and sweating, it was also such a tease that we were at the lake but can't go in the water as it was infested with crocodiles and hippos. From here we could see and hear a pair of fish eagles calling each other, from perches in dead trees.
From our campsite, we could saw the two elephants walking at the other side of the lake. Paul and I walked towards them. We hid behind a tree and observed them for a few minutes before they walked off into the thick bush. Back at the camp and very close to the shore was a big crocodile floating by. At times it was hard to relax, with all these dangers about!
In the other direction of where the elephants were, a very shy female bushbuck came to drink. She drank very quickly and as she started to walk back into the bush, another female came to drink.
05 Other Side
Looking out at the other side of the lake. This bushbuck was also very shy, drank quickly and ran into the bush.
I went back to my chair and continued to relax. An hour later a herd of impala came to drink. We then started the fire and enjoyed another evening in the bush.
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