Day 3… a very long drive in the Park
Today we decide to drive to Tshokwane, it is one of the most diverse routes for me with dams, plains, riverines and dense bush. Also one of my favorite birding spots is Leeupan. As per usual when I wake up the gas stove is lit and a kettle starts boiling as we freshen up for the day. After Wendy starts her second MMC we wait in front of the Gate. I tell you this MMC gives people stamina they never had… When we get to park in front of reception Wendy runs like speedy Gonzales to get our day permits as these JJ’s do take their time getting papers filled. I do my third wee for the day and as I return to the car she already waits for me. We pour ourselves some fresh MMC and enter the park trigger happy.
On our way to Tshokwane we had the following sightings: A hyena strolling in the road,
And on the Skuks low water bridge a croc drifting in the river,
Something I’ve never seen before was this baba ellie suckling, the view wasn’t great but it still was special for me to see, and at least the ellies were calm and in no rush to chase us down the road.
We turn on the S83-eastern entrance again to go check out the golden ones, as they were spotted there a few times this weekend and we had luck with them 2 days ago. All we saw was some flatties, but a sighting no-less. It wasn’t even hot and they were as lazy as ever…
Back on the H1-2 and we see a family of mongeese..mongooses…dwarfs that is checking out their surroundings by getting a higher vantage point.
And as per habit we turn to leeupan and nothing…nada…niks. What is going on here? As we get back on the tar we heard that we just missed a mating pair of golden crossing the road and only got to take this gagga kiekie…
Don’t you just love the plains just after Kruger Tablets?
In summer the birding is lekker here as the LBR’s, euros and the bee eaters just love this country. Here is tow purple rollers (which is one of my fave birdies in the park)
We freshened up at Tshokwane and decided to go to Orpen dam, when we reached the T-junction we had found out very unfortunately that the road was blocked on our side of the dam and you had to drive via the H10. We did a u-turn and informed another car about this too, they told us that they want to take the S35 as they had a lion sighting on their lonesome the day before, oh well we have time so for a second time I made the mistake in taking this route. Exactly a year ago I drove this road with Cheets and we had to play a drinking game to occupy ourselves with this road… The road was basically dead just as last time. We had a few nice sightings throughout the 30+kms or so:
Some ground hornbills,
Rhino, but they are so well hidden with the grass, and with my car which is not high enough-this could’ve been the reason that we missed everything?
We also saw some army folks checking out the road… There were halfway in a lot of vulture activity, we think there somewhere for eyes unseen was a kill of some sort,
Some of my best Euro roller kiekies was taken today,
We also had kudu and zeb hidden by some grass,
On our way back there weren’t much to see than the regular, except these verves that entertained us just past Sandriver low level bridge.
We got home at 2 and started the fire as soon as some KPA’s were popped. It was chilling time again as the fire crackled and the breeze blew past us. I was between my book and the baraaing of the meat whilst Wendy made a fresh and crispy salad. We also discussed what afternoon route we want to do. Which was basically just the S65->H1-1 home. After having some lekker boerewors and couscous salad we packed in KPA’s in the coolerbox and went on our way to do round number 2… This didn’t pine out as we planned. Our first skrik was at S65 waterhole when we reached a turn and slowed down to a stop because we saw a car at the dam, and when I just looked to my right a breeding herd was 2m away from me… My eyes almost shot out of my head and if I had a weaker bladder then it would’ve been a wet moment… At least we made the occupants in the other car laugh as I never pulled away so fast in my life-our heads actually bobbed… Here they are after we calmed down.
And then just before klipspringerkoppies we had this sighting… it was a bit of a roadblock but we survived… He ticked away our time that we had to turn around and not go via H1-1 home.
We got to the gate just in time and a sigh of relief was breathed. As we got home another KPA was to opened to flush all the stress and excitement away of our afternoon drive and as we settled in our seats while the sun set we couldn’t be happier about the day we had in the Park. Life here is just bliss…
To be continued