#Rhinocerosaurus

[benjaminsblog]

2.8.19 (Pilansberg pt.2)

Still cannot believe this is my job!  We were up sickeningly early, but after the shock wore off, the promise of what was to come woke me up. After a spot of breakfast, we got ready to go. Before we left, I spotted a baboon lope to a spot just outside the fence of the campsite, and as I watched, a whole posse rocked up, including some baby ones!

Once we were in the park, things got amazing real quick; most people like to try and spot the ‘Big 5′ (lion, leopard, rhino, elephant, buffalo), but I also had an eye on ‘Lion King bingo’ (lion, baboon, hornbill, hyena, meerkat, warthog). The first thing we saw - and one I really wanted to see - was a pair of white rhinos trotting along the side of the road! We got pretty close, but they are surprisingly skittish for walking tanks, and they hared off sharpish. We ended up seeing a bunch of rhinos throughout the day, and although we joked that it was getting old, the novelty never wore off.

Between the four of us, we managed to spot a lot of animals in the bush - zebras, wildebeest, and impala were plentiful, but the Big 5 members were proving tricky, despite rhinos coming out of our ears. We saw an elephant from (very) afar via binoculars, but privately I didn’t count that. Seeing other cars parked at random spots was often a good sign of action, and at one point we sidled up to a pair of them, and were rewarded with three young lions nestled in the grass beside the road! 

We had another mini-braai for lunch, in quite possibly the most stunning place I’ve seen; we drove up to Fish Eagle Site, which overlooks the humungous Mankwe Dam - it was teeming with wildlife around the banks, and it was a quite surreal experience - I did my best to take it in and feel overawed, but I think it was simply too majestic for my brain to fully compute! After lunch, we carried on touring the tracks, and the animals kept on coming! Giraffes were a frequent occurrence, we saw a large group of baboons chilling on the dam itself, and we drove right past a large herd of wildebeest camped out on the side of the road.

Our Big 5 hopes were fading fast - partly because each time we thought we saw an elephant, it turned out to be another rhino (ugh, so basic), but also because buffalo and leopard are incredibly rare to see. Leopard was top of my wishlist but I never harboured any real hope of seeing one, but we eventually managed to see some elephants without the aid of binoculars - we found a group of them at a watering hole - they were a bit far to get a good photo of, but that moment seemed to open the floodgates, and we saw loads of the blighters after that (London buses, am I right)! We saw a lot of calves among the big’uns, too, and our sightings got closer and closer until we could have virtually reached out and touched one. Alas, the buffalo and leopards remained elusive, but I was not in the least bit disappointed with our haul (I only missed out on Timon for Lion King bingo, which is a solid effort). We spent 11 hours in the park today!

It was a lo-o-ong journey back, and I got to experience SA driving at night (not fun), but eventually we made it home. We said our goodbyes and thanks to Brandon (and Kate), who has been our overseer at work as well as these two incredible days, and dragged ourselves up to our apartment. The enormity of everything I’ve seen hasn’t sunk in yet (I haven’t really had a chance to go over it all), but I am once again pinching myself that this is in fact my job - I have spent three weeks in South Africa masquerading as a work trip, but I have managed to fit in some incredible life experiences. I will be sorry to go, but also happy to spend some time at home. August looks pretty quiet for me, which is just as well, given that I’ll be spending virtually all of September & October in the Land of the Rising Sun...this can’t be happening!