Friday, 25 July 2008

Day 16




Well you know the old expression of “when ya gotta, go ya gotta go.” Well this happened to one of the guys yesterday. I couldn’t think of a more uncomfortable time to have to use the toilet than to have to use it out in the bush. We had just finished a nice cup of Rooibos tea and the dawn sun was just breaking through the treeline. We heard a low rumble from not far away. We then saw a Big Bull Elephant coming crashing through the trees heading for us. I don’t know whether this brought on the urge to use the toilet but we had to high tail it to a safer area for Moses and his call of nature. Moses survived the experience I’m glad to say though!

It must have been our lucky day because as we were stopping for a Bateleur Eagle sighting, Sean spotted something big moving to the North of us. We rely fairly heavily on the guys with the best eyesight in the group and Citi and Dee spotted a beautiful big male Rhino. (White) All I will say is holy God, the size of the thing. It was huge. I’d say easily over 2,000 KG. It’s foot print should give you the scale of the animal. It truly is massive. It looks like a big Brute, all power and probably not very smart. I’m delighted to have seen him. They normally rely on their sense of smell and hearing as their eyesight, like mine isn’t very good. It’s another one of the so called “Big 5,“ off my list. The “Big 5,” it’s believed were so named because they were considered by hunters to be the most dangerous animals in Africa. So I’ve seen Elephant, Buffalo and Rhino. I’m delighted we didn’t see all these animals in one day. I think that the fast food “Big 5,” suit some people but I think when you realize just how rare sightings of these animals are then you appreciate them more.

We came back to the College to relate our stories and boast about our good luck. The other group though were grinning from ear to ear when we came back. What had they seen? They were like big kids with a great secret and wouldn’t tell! In the end they let the “cat out of the bag,” so pardon the pun. They saw 4 Cheetah. A female and her 3 cubs. They got some great photo’s as well as they were very close. Now we have a mission for our game drive tomorrow. Look for Cheetah spoor and see if we can track them! They are a very rare sighting around here so my fingers are crossed but we’re not very hopeful of spotting them. Roll on 5 O’Clock……….

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