After a dinner of jaffles, we settled down to watch some stars - literally! I pulled out my old film camera, set it on a tripod and we settled down for 40mins of watching the stars as my camera allowed the stars to gather in light from the celestial bodies in the hope that I will get a picture of star trails. Watching stars is quite an amazing thing cause you really cannot help be in awe of creation as you stare out into the galaxies.
Yesterday morning started with me making jaffles for breakfast and then is heading out to the main camp so I could charge my laptop and iPad. Dad decided to sit with a book and read at the pool whilst my gadgets charged and whilst mom and I went for a drive.
The drive was another goodie! We came across a black rhino. Then we headed off to the general area of where a leopard had been seen the night before but knowing that leopards have a large range we weren't expecting much. Mom drove nice and slow past the area it had been seen but it was clearly not there. A few hundred meters down the road, I saw it! In the bush was a spotted face and I had to concentrate to see it. I told mom to stop. She thought I was joking until she too managed to decipher the spotted camouflage from the grass. We watched this graceful cat as it moved off into the veld, in amazement that we had seen it so relatively clearly in the day!!
We then moved on to a dam which is about 300m from where we saw the leopard as we had heard that there were lions there. We watched the so called King of the Jungle for a but before moving on - lions are cool but they are so lazy!! We were guaranteed to see them later again.
We returned to the main camp where I fought with my computer for a bit whilst mom told dad of our awesome drive and then returned home for a braai and a lazy afternoon. After our braai I retired to the comfort of the new hammock where I slept and read the afternoon away, waking occasionally to the bush sounds and hopeful that I could give a monkey a fright.
As we packed the landie for our evening drive, there was an air of excitement and anticipation. Would we see the leopard again? We doubted it but knew the lions would be up there so headed up there anyway. We cruised up past the dam where it had been seen the day before and I was occasionally jabbering on what's app to friends who were sharing their news with me. Then mom gasped, dad swerved, I saw a glimpse of cat and dropped my phone. There it was again: the leopard.
We grabbed our cameras and with shaking fingers we fired off a few rounds of digital shots. After recovering from the shock of a landie disturbing its afternoon nap, the leopard moved onto a big old fallen down tree where it posed for a photoshoot. It really was amazing. We sat for ages watching this beautiful cat pose for us and we managed to get some amazing pictures.
After an eternity of watching, we headed off to see the lions. We saw them for a while but they eventually headed off into the bush - clearly tired of all the attention.
After all the adrenalin we headed home for a dinner of leftovers - and in my case a piece of chocolate - before bed.
This morning we are taking it easy and chilling so unless a herd of elephant come walking up the driveway, there's not going to be much news!
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