No Fixed Abode: Hippo siesta

Wed 13 Jul 2016 - Mobile Safari Day 3: Moremi

The boys tent zipping up and down woke us many times last night, apparently there had been plenty of activity close by especially with the hyenas. The male lions had been roaring all night longer and at one point the hippo grunting sounded very close to camp. We quickly had a light brekkie and then headed out at 7.30 on the dot taking a new path out of camp. Lets stopped the truck to point out the footprints of the lions saying they would be close by and within 5 minutes of leaving we spotted two lions, brothers lounging in the golden grasses, head rubbing each other before getting up and purposefully striding off in the direction of a group of Impala. These two were most likely our noisy neighbours. We lost sight of them in the bush so we continued driving around getting the odd burst of the sun’s warmth as we headed out of the wooded areas on to the river and the grasslands. This morning’s drive was sedate with few sightings of something we’d not seen already yet as we headed back Lets, occasionally leaning out of the window to look for animal prints - a true tracker, turned around excitedly to announce that he had found leopard tracks and more importantly they we on top of the tyre tracks of a 4x4 we’d only just passed, meaning they were very recent. Lets turned the truck around and followed the tracks hanging out of the window until they disappeared into the bush whereupon he stopped and exclaimed there, leopard. We both craned our necks but it took us a long while to find the speckled side of a lone male lying under a bush - goodness knows how Lets had seen him. Then he stood up and wandered deeper into the bush, rolled in some dust and was gone.

KB had brunch ready for us and had been busy defending the camp from a group of small monkeys and himself from 4 elephants who had wandered in to scratch on the trees. As we ate we could here elephant rumblings and trumpeting with Lets advising us the elephants were being hassled by the lions probably. For the next few hours in camp we listened to roaring lions, trumpeting elephants and spotted many impala as they headed down to the river. We decided it was best to catch up on some sleep and the sanctuary of our tent before heading out for our evening drive.

Just before we left for the afternoon drive a herd of 20 elephants marched past very close to camp, presumably on the way to the river. It’s amazing how quiet they are and if you don’t keep your eyes scanning it would be easy to stumble on them. Down at the river we found a herd of elephants with young, possibly the same one that had passed our camp. Two of the large elephants stood with their backs to the river as if keeping guard and suddenly two lionesses appeared, which the elephants chased away.

Further along we came across a group of over 40 hippos nestled close together asleep against the bank with another 8 out of the bank sunning themselves. As we watched they awoke from their slumber and slowly dispersed into the river to return to normal hippo stuff such as yawning, making loud air blows as they came to the surface and youngster play fights.

While sitting around the campfire after dinner Lets suddenly shone his torch into the bush to reveal a large male lion that was walking by less than 20m from us. He seemed totally disinterested in us and Lets was very calm. We just looked at each other in disbelief and marvelled later that night how a thin piece of tent nylon provides apparent safety. Throughout dinner and all through night we continued to hear lions roaring close by. In the morning Lets explained it was probably two groups of males squabbling over females.

Campfire tale: KB had left soft oranges in his tent one night and an elephant arrived and could smell them. It ripped the top of the tent and felt all around KB with his trunk trying to find them and when it could not it kicked KB in the back and wandered off. From that day KB is, understandably, afraid of elephants.