So near but so far. And so it goes with the lions.
I had very fresh tracks soon after dark covering the elephants tracks I had been following. A male lion heading north. He then left the road and suddenly my luck came to an end.
That was the only evidence I had of lions all night.
Spud joined me at Bandama pan at sunset. He didn’t hang around long.
We picked up Mandlovu and her family after dark feeding north of Chivi. At first the youngsters weren’t too happy with us being there, as they aren’t used to being followed after dark with our lights. Then Mandlovu put her stamp on the whole thing. She walked up to the front of the car and pushed down hard on the bull-bar bouncing the car. I had to bang on the door to get her to stop. She backed off slowly and the herd resumed feeding. This was so unusual for Mandlovu to do this. In the 18 months that I’ve been following her she’s never done this, never even touched the car.
We followed the herd for a few hours and they were just fine. Then Darryl went down with 2 punctures. While he headed back to camp to repair them I caught some shut eye with the herds feeding all around me.
With Darryl back we followed the herd until they moved off into the hills to drink at Chimbiya spring. Obviously a no go area for us.
So it was back searching for lions. This time we moved further west to Banyini and Hwata. But out attempts were cut short when the rains came in the early hours of the morning. It wasn’t big rain, but the drizzle kept coming and going.
Again I caught some shut eye with my covers up.
The rain eased at dawn and on my way home I encountered these White rhino’s just south of Banyini.
Recent Comments