South Africa 13 — All Creatures Great and Small…

We had already seen an incredible variety of animals in the bush. While the Cape Buffalo would escape us on this trip, we were extremely fortunate to see other magnificent creatures during our morning and afternoon drives. Six out of the “Magnificent Seven” was more than we could ever have expected on a three night, four day safari. Some of the other animals we spotted included a jackal stalking in the high grass…

…we heard donkey-like braying that came from Zebras.

Are they white horses with black stripes or the other way around? It was curious to see birds on their backs, getting a free ride from the zebras. It is a symbiotic relationship, our guide explained. The birds feed on the ticks on the zebras and the zebras rid themselves of the parasitic ticks. This was a relationship that we would see on many animals… rhinos, giraffe, etc.

Birds on their backs or not, we saw the zebras doing the wild thing in the wild!

On an early morning drive, we drove up to a small pond and wondered how two incredibly smooth grey rocks seemed incredibly out of place in the middle of the water…

… just then, the smaller rock moved and ears, eyes and nostrils came up to take a breath. The rocks were two male hippos napping in the water hole. Sipho, our guide, explained that they had probably been kicked out of their herd and were now on their own.

Not lost to our guides Sipho and Louis were the avian creatures in the bush: the birds. We saw a lilac breasted roller, so called because they perform these rolling acrobatic turns in flight…

…a bateleur eagle, characterized by their short tails, was perched on a twig…

…and a male bearded woodpecker busy searching for insects.

There were wildebeests, also known as gnus, grazing under the watchful eyes of the bull…

… who seemed to be cautiously watching us. We were told that they are incredibly stupid, following each other like lemmings.

On another afternoon drive, as we drove by a grassy field, a warthog ran across and stopped to look at us. Looking very Pumbaa like, he raised his face to us and we clearly saw the characteristic warts on his face. Our guides told us that they sometimes eat warthogs, roasting them with herbs and spices.

On our last drive, we came across a troop of baboons. They were in a frenzy and our guide said they were in the process of figuring out the new alpha male.

I guess this baboon lost because we saw him high tailing it out of the group! We also saw but didn’t get photos of several mongoose crossing the roads, a Mozambique spitting cobra (venomous) right at our feet on the path from our villa to the main lodge, and a few others I can’t recall the names of. It was an exhilarating four days in the bush, an experience that we know will be with us for many years to come!

This post written by Mrs. MM. She is writing the giraffe one as well. Too much material from one trip! And this was only up to Day 3 or so. :)