Manyaleti game reserve next to Kruger, Feb 23-27, 2010

FINAL TWO BLOGS, LONG BLOGS.  ALL ABOUT OUR SAFARI...

We arrived for our 4 day safari in the afternoon and our animal sightings started right away.

As we drove in, this was part of the greeting committee.  We all decided this looked like a 3 headed giraffe.  It wasn't of course, but it looked that way at first.

When we arrived, there was a lovely lunch laid out for us, then it was off for our first photo game drive.

For ease, I have decided to divide this blog into sections of animals we saw, rather than do a time line...

HERD ANIMALS:

Cape buffalo covered in mud to keep cool.

New baby buffalo are lighter brown than the adults.  We went at a good time of year to see the younger animals.

Large herds of Cape buffalo

Nothing says "Africa" like zebras!

Except maybe a herd of wildebeest!

Kudu female

So many impala we stopped taking photos after the first day!! We saw 100 or more every day!

I know you know giraffes are tall, but they are REALLY tall!

And actually quite cute.

Often times the herd animals would be found together.

Do you see the impalas in the background with the wildebeest?

BIRDS, REPTILES AND SUCH:

European rollo

Lilac-breasted rollo.  A truly beautiful bird with amazing coloring!

Glossy starling.  They liked to come visit us at our lodgings. 

Vultures waiting in a tree for the lions to be done with their kill.

Couldn't remember what this one was, posted it on the blog and the next day John (our guide) emailed me with the name.  This is a Burchell's coucal.  Talk about service even after the fact!!

Saddle billed stork, one of a mated pair that live at one of the local watering holes.

White storks behind impalas.

White storks in flight, an amazing sight!  They are so big!

Golden orb spider, our closest friend during our drives through the bush!

Chameleon held by John, our ranger guide.

Back of an artichoke... not really.  It is a pangolin, a member of the anteater family.  John was so excited to see this creature.  He had never seen one in the wild before.

The pangolin is all rolled up as a defense mechanism.

He finally unrolled and walked away!  VERY COOL!!

BIG GAME ANIMALS:

We saw elephant almost every day.  Like giraffes, you don't realize just how big they really are until you see them up close.

Sometime we saw them up very close!

Rhinos look like the stepped out of the time of the dinosaur! 

 Yep, those little birds do just sit on their back and eat bugs off of them.

Hippos hang out in water all day, then eat grasses all night.

They weigh about 2 tons and are known to be the most dangerous animal to a human.

We saw lions every day.  We only saw females and young males.

The females are the hunters.  We saw kills two days of the four.  This zebra kill fed about 6 lions.  The wildebeest kill fed a group of 8.

This juvenile male is just starting to get his mane.

We were amazingly lucky to see leopards every day also.  We saw a total of 5 different leopards.  They are beautiful creatures.

Our last morning we spotted this mother with her two cubs, which were about 3 months old.  

It was an amazing 20 minutes watching them interact, then watching the mother hide them in the bush, likely so she could go out and hunt.

Talk about adorable!  Three months old and you can see the intelligence and power, even at this young age.

NIGHT DRIVES:

The sunsets were spectacular.

But it gets really dark, really fast...

As it gets dark, we can see how the flash light picks up the eyes of the animals.  This is how Alfie, our tracker finds the animals at night.

Alfie was amazing!  This spotted owlette was one of the kids' favorite nocturnal animals.  It is actually quite small.

The big cats were not bothered at all by the spotlight.  This leopard was hunting.

Lions drinking, lots of lions drinking.

We saw so many amazing animals and the amount and variety was total unexpected.  We ran into a man at the airport who had just finished his second trip and got to see his first and only lion this trip.  We saw lions, leopards, elephants, rhinos, hippos, etc every day!!