Just when you think things are too good to be true and your luck must be running out...it happens all over again. With profoundly different weather from the mornings rain we set out on a beautiful sunny afternoon. All the general game seemed to have found its way out of the thickets and we were bumping into lots of new things.
After seeing a rhino bull wallowing, kudu and impala we started to make our way to the Nottens side of the reserve. As we approached the open area we found ourselves in the middle of a huge aggregation of animals which included wildebeest, zebra, kudu, impala and warthog. The guests were loving it and were all taking photos. My tracker Solly even got employed as photographer for one of the guests, a job which made his face light up with joy!
About five minutes later we found ourselves watching our big new male, who has been named 'M' because of the M shaped making on his face (see the photo above), while he slept away on an open area. Whilst watching him a young elephant bull came out of the bush to say hi and then disappeared into the thick bush again. Eventually M got up and started to get on the move just after the sun had set and the temperatures had dropped. He started scent marking and we followed him for about an hour before he lay down for a sleep in the long grass and we could no longer see him.
This mornings mission was to find the lions. So we headed south and found fresh tracks in no time. After about forty minutes of following the tracks we were force to follow them on foot as they had left the road. This led to the next road and we were back on the vehicle following the tracks again. Eventually Arthur found the last tracks close to the fence line and they had headed back into the reserve. He decided to head round to the next road and I decided that Solly and I would follow their tracks through the grass on foot. So we headed off to the last tracks and saw where they had been lying...from there we could see the bent grass where they had walked and began to follow...we hadn't walked 3 metres before the bush in front of us sprung to life with four lionesses hissing and growling and then running in the opposite direction to us. I had in this time chambered a round and was staring at the fleeing cats down the sight of my rifle... WHAT A RUSH!!! The guests had been watching the whole thing from the vehicle and as we walked back to the vehicle all I could see were the whites of their eyes.
We followed these ladies for a while and then headed off to find some elephants that had been seen earlier. The morning was topped off by a great walk through the bush back to the lodge...what a great morning!
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