The Big Cat Diary and a Couple of Lifers

[Alf]

Wonderful bird spotting

[Flutterby]

Jealous of the Plum-coloured Starling - never seen one in Kruger before.

Such a cute ellie!

[Dewi]

Stunning birds, bats & baby ellie pics Pumbaa.

Those yellow leg warmers on the green pigeons always make me smile.

[Pumbaa]

The fig tree what a great find, such a variety of bird life Also nice to see the fruit bats Not bad just to stay in camp

The tiny elephant calves are always sure to find protection ....and they are sooo cute
Incredible that they never get trampled

Yes, that day we had luck with the birdies inside camp and enjoyed the break from driving very much

love Starlings, Pigeon and Bat
and the tiny "grey one"

The tiny grey ones are the cutest

Another bird episode Well, almost... if it wasn't for that cute little ellie and the exciting find of the bat

I love those plum-coloured starlings. Would love to see one of those

We also do not see them often and are always happy when they do come across

[Pumbaa]

Wonderful bird spotting

Always a must to stand in front of a tree and do the bird watching

Jealous of the Plum-coloured Starling - never seen one in Kruger before.

Such a cute ellie!

Will hold thumbs for you in finding one

Stunning birds, bats & baby ellie pics Pumbaa.

Those yellow leg warmers on the green pigeons always make me smile.

Me too and I love the colours - At least the will never get cold legs

[Pumbaa]

and each herd had worked out their own different elephant calf protection tactics.





We had a fantastic time and stayed quite long and as we had left early enough we still had time left for a longer stay at Transport dam. When we arrived there we were all alone and simply enjoyed the silence and the begin of the golden hour. A lot of waterbucks were around



and a huge crocodile was taking an extensive sunbath, Egyptian goose could be heard and a fish eagle seen in a far away tree.



Then two safari vehicles from outside arrived and it got unfortunately loud as all the passengers including the guides were talking extreme loud to each other. Despite the smatter a rhino mom with her calf dared to come closer, followed by some ecstatic jubilation from the safari excursion.



The hippos did not bother and simply stayed in their precious wet pool.



whereas the rhino mom and her youngster even dared to take a drink after they looked extreme carefully into all directions.



Gladly meanwhile also the loud Safari vehicles drove off but for us it was also time to leave and we took it slowly back to camp and stopped for a troop of baboons who wanted to cross the street



and even an elephant bull had somewhere an urgent date and had not time in neither look right nor left.



De Laporte waterhole became more and more another favourite of ours and so our final stop for that day to utilise the time until gate closing time we did there. A poor hippo had took over that waterhole in the absence of other adequate water sources



and we were about to leave when we noticed also a lone hyaena who took a nap behind the waterhole.



Compared to the previous days this day was a bit quieter but we enjoyed everything we saw and especially the rain was a wonderful gift. The day ended with another delicious braai on our verandah whilst the bush around us got darker and darker.

[Pumbaa]

Saturday, 20 February, 2016 – Skukuza – Satara

Roads we drove today: H11 – S1 – S65 – H1-1 – H4-1 – H12 – H1-2 – S36 – H7 – H1-6 – S100

Before we headed directly forward to Satara we simply had to drive the short detour via the S65 as we wanted to pay N’waswitshaka and De LaPorte waterholes a final visit so we did not wasted any time and after the obligatory brewing hot morning coffee on our verandah overlooking the Sabie we packed everything together and left camp.

For sure we had to stop for another breathtaking sunrise in the bush





unfortunately it was extreme quiet today and we did see nothing until we reached N’waswitshaka but same was once again highly frequented despite the early morning hour. A great sighting for sure was the green grass and leaves which sprouted over the last day after the rains that fell the day before – I could not believe how fast the grass started to sprout after only a bit of rain!

The elephants already took over the basin





and some late comers are always amongst them.





The impalas were drinking from the waterhole



and also a couple of giraffes were about to arrive



and for sure elephant after elephant invaded that place.



Also the huge elephant bull from the previous days was hanging around that place, gladly he stayed the whole time he was there peacefully.



to be continued....

[Dewi]

Another great series of pics Pumbaa. Love the little ellie with its ears flapping.

[Lisbeth]

For sure elephants in all sizes are not missing

[nan]

love all the babies... specially the big fan