Weekend with Lions
We were planning on taking it easy for the weekend. We have a test most Saturday mornings so it rules Friday nights out for having a few tinies. We had an exam on Birds on Saturday morning. (Birds being the feathered variety). We get up early in the mornings so it was hard to get out of the scratcher at 5 to do that last bit of cramming. The last time I think I was up at that time was in first year in College back in Dublin. Myself and Steve Keating would get up early and cram. He was a little bit more successful than my good self. Anyway that’s a long time ago and the exams this time are about something that I have an interest in. I could never understand where the elasticity of supply and demand would be of benefit to me in real life! So 11 O’clock comes around and as the man says “job done.”
Time to chillax! It was pretty hot so we took a few hours off to relax and then I decided I wanted to hit Kruger for some game viewing. We’re so lucky to have Kruger literally on our doorstep. We can head into the park whenever we want and the best thing is that we have these cool Wildcards that mean we can use any of the 88 National Parks in South Africa for the measly sum of 110 Rand for the year. Yes now that’s what I call value. That’s about a tenner in Euro for the year. Sure you wouldn’t get two scoops in Dublin for that! Well maybe in Mellon Balls shop but not many other places.
We hadn’t really any expectations going into the park and as Birdman says “Nature is full of surprises.” We travelled North into the park and stopped off for a coffee and sambo for lunch. Our appetites and thirst sated we headed out to what I know call “Big Cat Alley,” or the S100. We didn’t have to wait long before we see a line of cars parked up ahead of us. We pulled in and patiently! waited our turn to see what the other people were looking at. It looked like it was a big male Lion lying on the ground. We could just see his dark mane from where we were parked. On closer inspection though we realised that there were actually two Lions on the ground. Our luck was certainly in. We were within 5 metres of two Lions mating! What a sight. It was amazing. In typical female fashion the Lioness was just lounging about leaving the male to do all the work!! There was nothing else on their minds. Lions apparently mate for up to two days and the frequency of mating can be anything up to every fifteen minutes! Unbelievable! Sure you’d need a holiday after all that! Well we didn’t have that much time to spend with them although we could have spent all day. The male was in magnificent condition. I’d say he weighed in at easily 220 Kilograms. The Lioness though was in bad shape. She looks like she has TB. Her body was very emaciated and she seemed to have a bit of a limp. It was a pity because it’s very rare to have Lions so close to the road and to have seen two healthy specimens would have been the ultimate Lion sighting.
We were really buzzing after that regardless. Even the “Special One,” was in top form. He was even throwing in some gags here and there! I decided to give “Special One,” a driving lesson on the way back. He was fairly nervous which made me nervous. I told him we were gonna do some emergency stop scenario’s so every now and again I’d scream that there was an Elephant in the road just ahead. He was a bit slow on the take up of this scenario and we would have rammed the poor auld Elephant but he soon got the hang of it and was stopping nicely. These things have a habit of making fantasy into reality and about an hour later a big bull Elephant did actually fly out on to the road ahead of us. I was in stitches as the poor fecker was sweating it trying to pull the car up! It’s lucky the Elephant didn’t charge us because I wouldn’t fancy his chances of being able to find reverse!
We got back to the college in one piece anyway with only a few more grey hairs to add to my Badger Head. We were invited to a Braai later on in the evening so we just had time to collect a few tastey beverages and grab a shower before hitting the Braai. We had a couple of nice T Bone steaks and a couple of cans of Castle beer under the African sky. Not a bad way to spend an evening and then we hear this roaring. 3 male Lions had made a kill right beside the college. They had caught the Buffalo right by the fence and it sounded so close you’d swear the Lions were on our side of the fence! The sound was amazing. It would put the shits up you and it stirs something very carnal in you. A few of the guys from the college decided to investigate further but I had my sensible hat on for once and decided not to go down. Apparently the Lions were down by the drainage line where I run by every day. The fence to be honest wouldn’t fill me with a massive amount of confidence. Consider how far your average domesticated cat can jump and then multiply that by about a figure you pull out of your head. I haven’t seen a Lion jump before but I’m sure they wouldn’t have much difficulty clearing the fence if they were hungry. Anyway the Lions kept roaring all night. I was actually disappointed when they decided to move off and the roaring stopped in the morning. I’m sure we’ll see and hear much more and I could get used to it!
Oh and by the way check out this you tube video we took one day in Kruger!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YxHOppq871c
We were planning on taking it easy for the weekend. We have a test most Saturday mornings so it rules Friday nights out for having a few tinies. We had an exam on Birds on Saturday morning. (Birds being the feathered variety). We get up early in the mornings so it was hard to get out of the scratcher at 5 to do that last bit of cramming. The last time I think I was up at that time was in first year in College back in Dublin. Myself and Steve Keating would get up early and cram. He was a little bit more successful than my good self. Anyway that’s a long time ago and the exams this time are about something that I have an interest in. I could never understand where the elasticity of supply and demand would be of benefit to me in real life! So 11 O’clock comes around and as the man says “job done.”
Time to chillax! It was pretty hot so we took a few hours off to relax and then I decided I wanted to hit Kruger for some game viewing. We’re so lucky to have Kruger literally on our doorstep. We can head into the park whenever we want and the best thing is that we have these cool Wildcards that mean we can use any of the 88 National Parks in South Africa for the measly sum of 110 Rand for the year. Yes now that’s what I call value. That’s about a tenner in Euro for the year. Sure you wouldn’t get two scoops in Dublin for that! Well maybe in Mellon Balls shop but not many other places.
We hadn’t really any expectations going into the park and as Birdman says “Nature is full of surprises.” We travelled North into the park and stopped off for a coffee and sambo for lunch. Our appetites and thirst sated we headed out to what I know call “Big Cat Alley,” or the S100. We didn’t have to wait long before we see a line of cars parked up ahead of us. We pulled in and patiently! waited our turn to see what the other people were looking at. It looked like it was a big male Lion lying on the ground. We could just see his dark mane from where we were parked. On closer inspection though we realised that there were actually two Lions on the ground. Our luck was certainly in. We were within 5 metres of two Lions mating! What a sight. It was amazing. In typical female fashion the Lioness was just lounging about leaving the male to do all the work!! There was nothing else on their minds. Lions apparently mate for up to two days and the frequency of mating can be anything up to every fifteen minutes! Unbelievable! Sure you’d need a holiday after all that! Well we didn’t have that much time to spend with them although we could have spent all day. The male was in magnificent condition. I’d say he weighed in at easily 220 Kilograms. The Lioness though was in bad shape. She looks like she has TB. Her body was very emaciated and she seemed to have a bit of a limp. It was a pity because it’s very rare to have Lions so close to the road and to have seen two healthy specimens would have been the ultimate Lion sighting.
We were really buzzing after that regardless. Even the “Special One,” was in top form. He was even throwing in some gags here and there! I decided to give “Special One,” a driving lesson on the way back. He was fairly nervous which made me nervous. I told him we were gonna do some emergency stop scenario’s so every now and again I’d scream that there was an Elephant in the road just ahead. He was a bit slow on the take up of this scenario and we would have rammed the poor auld Elephant but he soon got the hang of it and was stopping nicely. These things have a habit of making fantasy into reality and about an hour later a big bull Elephant did actually fly out on to the road ahead of us. I was in stitches as the poor fecker was sweating it trying to pull the car up! It’s lucky the Elephant didn’t charge us because I wouldn’t fancy his chances of being able to find reverse!
We got back to the college in one piece anyway with only a few more grey hairs to add to my Badger Head. We were invited to a Braai later on in the evening so we just had time to collect a few tastey beverages and grab a shower before hitting the Braai. We had a couple of nice T Bone steaks and a couple of cans of Castle beer under the African sky. Not a bad way to spend an evening and then we hear this roaring. 3 male Lions had made a kill right beside the college. They had caught the Buffalo right by the fence and it sounded so close you’d swear the Lions were on our side of the fence! The sound was amazing. It would put the shits up you and it stirs something very carnal in you. A few of the guys from the college decided to investigate further but I had my sensible hat on for once and decided not to go down. Apparently the Lions were down by the drainage line where I run by every day. The fence to be honest wouldn’t fill me with a massive amount of confidence. Consider how far your average domesticated cat can jump and then multiply that by about a figure you pull out of your head. I haven’t seen a Lion jump before but I’m sure they wouldn’t have much difficulty clearing the fence if they were hungry. Anyway the Lions kept roaring all night. I was actually disappointed when they decided to move off and the roaring stopped in the morning. I’m sure we’ll see and hear much more and I could get used to it!
Oh and by the way check out this you tube video we took one day in Kruger!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YxHOppq871c
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