Some new animals today

Looks like some of the younger guys stayed up too late last night and subsequently missed the drive today.  They will get a kicking for this - the expectation is everyone turns up for all drives, no excuses (baring illness).  The penalty will be to clean the 3 land-cruisers and appologise to the rest of us.

They may have had an extra hour in bed but they missed some good sightings this morning.  We started with tracks again with Ed and found some really good ones, including a Serval which we hadn't seen before, and a rodent hole with the remains of a snake egg outside it.  Clearly a snake had hatched recently but we couldn't tell what type.

We then got a call of lions on a young giraffe kill about 15 mins drive away.  We jumped on the cruiser and headed off there.  Then out of no-where there was a Serval in front of us.  This was a great spot as they are so rarely seen here (the grass on a lot of the plains is very long).  We followed him for a few minutes but he vanished into the grass. One guy got a very faint photo but not much else, never-the-less we were all very happy.

By the time we got to the lions the 2 females had gone and only the sub-adult male and female were still there.  They were under a bush just chilling out with fat stomachs.  2 other cruisers turned up so we left and headed back to camp.  We needed to be back by 10 as a guy was supposed to bringing a 4x4 for Rach and I to look at and maybe buy (in the end he didn't turn up and re-arranged to come on Monday or Tuesday instead).

This afternoon (after JP laid down the law on none attendance of drives) he took us on a drive and within minutes we found 3 of the rhinos; the big male and the sub-adult male and female).  We had a few minutes Q&A (JP asking the Q's, us trying to answer) and then headed off for some more tracks and trails.  We got to a place on the road where there was a nice snake track (probably an African Python).  We were all standing around talking about the track, how to identify the direction it was moving etc when Javi spotted a snake in the grass - JP insisted we all jump on the cruiser quickly and there about a yard away was a very venomous Snouted Cobra (this guy did not make the track).  Unfortunately he got wind of us and quickly slithered off into the bush and out of sight - again showing that even snakes choose flight rather than attack.

We then headed to a plain (Termite Plain) to look for signs.  We were checking out wilderbeest marks (rubbings) on trees when Thyrza looked across the next plain and casually pointed out that 2 cheetah were sitting watching us (about 100 yards away)!  So we had been looking at trees, whilst cheetah were wondering what the hell we were doing and why we weren;t interested in them.  The cats were on a kill (an impala we were to find out) but were very relaxed.  We walked back to the car and drove down to them - by now the one cat had moved a few yards away from the road and the other was back on the kill eating, all the time looking around for other predators. 

This is a natural behaviour as in most reserves, where there are spotted hyena, cheetah often lose their kill to the bigger animals.  There are no spotted hyena here (only brown) or wild dogs, and leopards are rarely seen, so these cheetah very raerly lose their kill.  There was a jackal watching the 2 cats from a short distance away, waiting for them to move off so he could move in and pick the bones.

We called the kill in and the 1 monthers plus a tourist cruiser turned up. The tourists were japanese, and true  to form they took their one photo and departed, leaving the way for another cruiser of tourists to turn up and meaning we could stay in the lock (technical term for a sighting).

The cats moved off and we followed (we can't go off road for cheetah so as they headed across the plain we circled round to where we thought they would cross the raod again).  We got the judgement perfect and the cats actually walked between 2 of the parked cruisers and scent marked on a tree directly (a yard) away from the 1 monther's cruiser.  The one cheetah then jumped into and climbed the tree to scent mark higher up - very cool sighting and rarely seen action by a cheetah.  The faces on the 1 monthers was one of utter amazement - in our cruiser we captured the moment nicely :)  When we spoke to the 1 monthers later all they could say was how fast their hearts we beating, having a cheetah a yard away and in a tree looking down on them.

The cats moved off and we left the lock.  On the way back to camp we have a new bird sighting - a Combed (or knob billed) Duck.  It was a fly-over in dusk so the photo is not as cool as the sighting!

Went to TV room after the drive whilst waiting for dinner to catch an old episode of Top Gear.....wonder if our friends back in the UK miss us?