Location: Sabi Sabi, South Africa
After lunch and a rest, we went back out at 4:00pm. And almost immediately found a family of elephants.
We then drove around for a bit before finding a lone male Impala.
As we neared sunset there were some birds.
We took a break as the sun set, and were a little disappointed. The elephants were great, but they were really the only things we saw. Then someone spotted a leopard.
Another difference between my previous safari in Kenya and here is the use of spotlights. In Kenya we just returned to our camp at dark. Here the guide has a spotlight – there are rules when you are allowed to use it and you can’t blind the animals. But it sure proved its worth here.
We had three vehicles keeping the leopard spotted. I liked how they took turns getting close and using only one light so the guests in that vehicle had a better picture taking chance. I learned a lot about reduced-light work with a camera – some of my automatic shutter speeds took over a second, leading to amazing blurred images. But enough came out.
Then we spotted a hyena trailing the leopard – probably looking to filch a meal.
What a great day. I’m looking forward to tomorrow, even if it includes waking up at 5:30am.