Wildcast

We started off with a brilliant dawn and the first few hours of the day the light was stunning.

Of course all the action was on the airstrip again. While I parked in the centre of the strip the giraffe, impala and zebra came and went all around me.
Today, and most days actually, all the giraffe were bulls. It’s not uncommon for the bulls to hang out together.

And today these 2 younger bulls, although just mimicking a fight, looked a lot more romantically involved than one would care to think. Even getting to the stage where they tried to mount each other.

I spent several hours on the strip, only really ‘cos I found I’d dozed off. I was lying on the ground getting those precious low angle shots and while waiting for animals to move into view I had obviously dozed off. I don’t know what shots I missed but I still got lucky with a few special shots.

Now awake I left the airstrip heading east in search of whatever I might find. I was surprised to find fresh elephant activity a few kilometres down the drag. I thought these guys were still all down south in the clays. I had actually tried to get down there earlier but it was a no go. Still too wet to even travel on the roads.
I was lucky to pick up the herds to the north of Chivi. But that didn’t last. In the middle of nowhere I had to cross the little Chimbiya stream, which was fine, as it’s got sandy bottom and no big deal. The big deal came when my back wheel slipped into a small elephant wallow on the edge of the stream. Now I was well and truly stuck. But that’s not a big deal. With my trusty hi-lift jack, a spade and an axe I can usually get myself out of almost anywhere and this wasn’t a big deal.

But I was frustrated as the elephant were all having a huge party on the edge of the stream about 80m away and I couldn’t get there to film.
So I jacked away, chopped up tree stumps, put them under the wheels and drove off only to get stuck a meter further. Progress was slow and now I had to dig away the far bank so the belly of the vehicle didn’t drag on it.
I had 2 wheels on the far side and just couldn’t get up. So I took a brave decision, I rammed the car in reverse and took off for the far bank. The wheels were spinning before I got to the far bank.
Forgetting about any short cuts, I settled in to the laborious task of working on each wheel. That done I was easily out, now an hour and a half later.
I was so worked up that I’d got stuck AND missed all the elephant action that I wasn’t in any mood to take photos of my dilemma, but eventually gave in with this self portrait.

The elephants by now had given me the slip and it started raining.
Cutting my losses I headed back to camp.