Gearing up, I calculated how quickly I might be
able to get to the Olifants Rest Camp. I'll be there in no time, I remember
thinking. I was coming down around this bend above at a good clip and
just as I was rounding the bend an elephant started crossing the road. I
slammed on the breaks and he backed up, rearing high his trunk and sounding
that screaming horn.
Needless to say, we scared the crap out of each
other.
He eyed me from the bush and I marveled at the
size, right here, before me. I realized immediately this would be no
quick jaunt to the Rest Camp. We watched one another until he grew
comfortable enough to go on and cross the road.
I rolled up next to him for a few more pictures
and he tolerated me for only a few minutes. Then he faced me, held his ears out
wide, reared his trunk again and told me to get lost. He took a few quick
steps towards me and that was enough persuasion. Stick shift in hand, I speed shifted, as my
father once taught me, and at a comfortable clip I was gone and let that
elephant be.
It wasn't a mile or so before I came across a
large troop of baboons. This little one below was playing along side the
road and took a few moments to regard me in a my red car. They were a
pretty feisty troop, a couple of them getting into fights every few
minutes and starting up a racket that the whole troop took part in vocalizing.
Continuing to roll along at a slow pace, I came
across this herd of elephants below.
They weren’t even a mile farther down the road. I counted eleven,
tightly packed together, all of them just standing, flapping their ears.
Major arteries run just under the skin behind those ears and so the
flapping cools their blood. These elephants were so tightly packed
together that I wondered if maybe there were some young'uns in the center of
the group. A few more cars came along and stopped to take some
photographs and made the elephants a little uncomfortable. They turned to
leave and as they did, my suspicion was confirmed. You can see one of the babes
in the third photo.
The ubiquitous Impala. These animals are
absolutely everywhere (the proverbial African rabbit). Naturally my
enthusiasm to photograph them quickly waned.
At one point, however, about a week later, I saw a small stampede of
impala and one jumped higher than I’ve ever seen any living thing jump. It cleared a small tree, and just seemed to
float in the air. A school bus could
have been in it’s way and it wouldn’t have had a problem.
At an intersection, a park service man pulled up
next to me as I studied a map and offered to lead me to Olifants Camp when we
realized we were going the same way. He
pointed out this mother hyena on the way. She keeps her brood in a small tunnel
under the road.
All that by merely driving into the park...
The entrance to the Olifants Rest Camp was much
like starting a tour at Jurassic Park: A
big wooden gate with torches and false elephant tusks jutting out on either
side. An extravagant affair, not really
my style.
My bungalow at Olifants Camp was a small
circular structure with a thatch roof. A
neat little home with two beds and a bathroom and a small porch. It even had air conditioning, believe it or
not. Hot water showers, even a full size
refrigerator.
Now if you stood just here where I was when I
took this picture of the Bungalow, and then turned left, you’d see my view,
just below: African veld to the East,
towards Mozambique.
Every morning I breakfasted at the Camp
restaurant, perched up high on a cliff before the Olifant river facing
south. Each morning there, I took time
to write, to read, and to watch. Far
below while I ate, the river did not appear to offer much more than what a
casual glance could offer; but a pair of binoculars and patience led to the
discovery of wonderful things hiding in plain sight. All sorts of wildlife can be seen on the
river. Every morning I saw crocs,
hippos, impala and many other kinds of animals at the water’s edge.
The one other thing I had booked in advance was
a walking Safari. But it was to be much farther south in the Park
and I had a few days to kill. I did go
on a couple game drives, letting someone else take over the steering wheel on a
much larger open aired truck, but for the most part, Safari here was a matter
of getting in your own car and just driving around – just making it up as you
go, listening to rumors of sightings and getting to know the area. That first day, after waking up in the Park,
I set out to find some cats. As I was
looking for them, I came across the iconic African tree. The road along side was a kind of back road
in the park with very little traffic, the like of which I travelled on for most
of my extemporaneous safari. Main roads
in the park, however, are all paved and wonderfully maintained, but relatively have
a lot more traffic.
More impala.
They’re everywhere and they can certainly afford to lose a few family
members to some cats.
Herd animals generally like to stay in open
spaces for reasons of protection, however, these zebra seemed quite comfortable
enclosed tightly by trees on each side.
I had come this way, having heard a rumor that
large cats were in the area. My
confirmed proof is in the photo below.
These zebra were definitely in lion territory. I came across cat tracks a dozen times that
day, but alas, saw no cats.
Siblings posing nicely, eyeing me, wary of what
I might do. Nonetheless, they all let me
get quite close while I was still in my car.
(It is illegal to get out of one’s car in the park, unless accompanied
by an armed guard.)
Probably my favorite zebra picture below. The black and white stripes popped nicely
against the green foliage.
On a bridge crossing the wide olifants river I
spotted one of the only crocs I’d see.
This was a rather small one, probably six or seven feet long.
Searching for cats on the back roads, I started
to hear a strange kind of roar. Not yet
knowing what the strange moan-groan of a lion sounds like, I thought this roar
might be a cat. It came from the river
and I pulled my fiat off the dirt road, into a gap in the brush and found a
window to the river. A hippo was defending
it’s little grassy patch on the river, bellowing at a nearing neighbor.
No cats on my first day going around on my own,
but the day was not short of life… I
planned on going north the following day, knowing my family was probably
wondering what had happened to me since I’d left North America several days
prior.
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