Celeste & Bill Circumnavigate the globe World Cruise 2015

Friday, April 10, 2015

April 1, 2015

Day 3, Our Safari

Okay I don’t know if it is the air or the bouncing around in the Land Rover but I am sleeping like a baby! 5:00am wake call comes and I don’t want to get out of this bed. All Bill says is Elephants, Giraffes and more and up I jump. After a quick shower and a couple of sips of tea we are headed back out!

What will we find today. We are driving around for a while and nothing this can’t be there has to be some animal out there. After about 20 minutes of not seeing anything because we all know how patient I am. I am ready to start yelling “Come out Come out wherever you are” and Enoch stops the car and says listen. Of course I don’t hear anything but before long I see a herd of Cape Buffalos. They are noisy when they all walk together. Two males were trying to eat off the same plant and they had a show down it was quite interesting to see. One snorted and did something with his paw and backed off in disgust! Noel our tracker said to look to the left and there was a herd of Rhinos. These are the White Rhinos. Now I always thought a white rhino would be white. Wrong it is a special species because of the number of bumps( I am calling it bumps as I can’t remember the correct terminology and if anyone wants to test me too bad!)

They are really big. We saw a few more giraffes and a hyena boy are they ugly. The first night at the Boma(barnfire) the hyena ran up to get some food from the buffet and they chased it so all we saw was the back end running away. Don’t want to meet one of them!!!! We have seen a warthog and mongoose but they both ran off before I could get the camera pointed! Before long we see another leopard this one walks right along the side of the jeep now all that is between me and it is this flimsy door. The others are raised I am ground level I have my camera ready and it yawns now if there was no stick shift in the middle I would have been in Enoch’s lap. He says don’t hide take the picture I said I can’t I’m too scared. My hands were shaking so unfortunately I did not get that picture but I will see if someone else did! We were all laughing and Mike said no worries it will eat Noel first as he sits outside the car and Enoch came back with “Nah they only eat white meat! We were hysterical!

We are not allowed to walk back to our lodges alone after dinner. We are ok in the am but not at night and I see along the path to the front door that there is elephant dung on the side and I ask about this. Apparently the elephants will sometimes wonder right across your pathway. We have been warned that they are not the cute domesticated ones and they will attack a person if they are out of the jeep~ thanks something else I have to worry about.

Except that there are no Tigers in Africa I keep saying “Lions and Tigers and Bears of my” I feel just like the cowardly lion.

This afternoon both 4x4s were taken down to the river to see the Hippos. Apparently more people are killed by Hippos in Africa than any other animal. Do Not Go in their water!!!!! All 13 of us with our two guides carrying their guns and the two trackers carrying their machetes walk down to the river’s edge! Did you know that a hippo can hold his breath and head under the water for almost 5 minutes nah I didn’t either. They are really really big and they look so cute. Luke and Chris if you are ready this all I could think of was the game we use to play Hungry Hungry Hippos! Cute but apparently very dangerous animals. Wow we have seen Lions, Elephants, Rhinos, Leopard, Cape Buffalo all the big 5 plus, Zebras, Giraffes and Antelopes, Hyenas, Kudos plus a snake and a few lizzards! Dozens of birds but the one thing we have not seen (Thank God) is mosquitos. We are on anti-malaria medicine as this is considered a hot spot for malaria but we have not seen one mosquitos and believe me there could be 5000 people and one mosquito and it would bite me!

Tonight we went out hunting for the rest of the lions apparently there were three the other day who had taken down a cape buffalo and ate the whole thing and this is why they are sleeping they are so full! we made roads where none were it was an awesome experience but no lion. as we were heading on a road we see a mother and cub leopard. They look at us and just keep doing what they do. We follow them and Enoch calls the other ranger and they meet up with us. We must have followed them for an hour until they gave us a final look at headed into the bushes. I think they hear the jeeps and say “Oh Crap more of those stupid tourists, we have to put on a show for them”

We never saw the lions but I sat up on top to see the perspective from there. I think you get bounced around much more but you can see the animals a little better.

We stop in the clearing for sundowners (cocktails) they have canapés also and we spend a little while here. I tell Lois she can have her seat back I am not climbing up there. I can’t believe that we are on our last full day. This Safari is almost over! We head back and we are taken to a beautiful clearing in the bush where they built a lovely deck and it is all lit up with torches and they have the long tables set up with the tablecloths and they have a special dinner for us tonight. They had fresh fish, beef, chicken and antelope. Veggies and salads. The food has been great. They also have a roaring barn fire and we are each given wooden spears to toast marshmallows and they have chocolate sauce to dip them in!

Heaven I’m in heaven!!!!!

Another wonderful day. What a wonderful world.