Etosha Aoba Lodge Etosha National Park

... of animals making their entrances and exits. It made it very hard to tear ourselves away and go to bed. No photos because it got left in the tent, plus it wasn't good enough for night photography! Anyway, sometimes, its nice just to enjoy the moment without thinking photos!

The next morning there was a small herd of Zebra there, thay made for good photos! Our guide said that had not seen that waterhole that busy before.

... in Malawi =)

So morning number three (the last day for game drives) began without us having seen any rhinos. We had some words with our guide, Innocent, who staked his job on the fact that we would see a rhino before we left the park. We HAD to see a rhino; it was the last animal we needed to complete the "BIG FIVE". For those of you who have not been to Africa and heard of the "Big Five", it is a group of animals who were notorious to the hunters back in the day, because they were ...

... masters. The table next to us was also playing and Sophie had joined so that we began a tournament that lasted the entire drive.

At one of our bathroom stops we were told there were local indigenous people selling crafts, however if you wanted to take a picture of them they would charge you. We soon saw why one would want to take a picture. These were the people who paint their skin red and wear large ...

... egg – yum! After this we went on a drive, we decided to go to 'Spooky Wood’ which is west of the camp, and you can only go so far, after that only Namibian tourist vehicles can go. Along the way we drove through perfect cheetah country – flat with oodles of game – we decided if we didn’t see one now, our chances were pretty slim! Typically we didn’t see any!

But what we did se was an amazing amount of game at Ozonjuitji ...

... straight road, so we could see a long way and we could see a car stopped further down. As we approached he flashed his lights at us and as we slowed down I could see shapes lying in the road – lions!!

As we got closer we could see there were several – I counted ten, and they had made a kill as they had blood on them and were fat and full. They were quite skittish and most of them walked into the bush as we approached but one younger male stayed out and just ...

... They had good rains this year a bonus to all.

Sunday we were up early again and waiting for the gate to open. This time we covered the eastern section. This part of Etosha is more scenic, there’s more water, more trees and therefore some different animals to be seen. We were pleased to see some eland at last, a glimpse of a hyena, several warthogs and kudu, plus black-faced impala. Three lions were ...

... The truck is due back around 6 upon which time the fire will be stoked and dinner prepared. We have veggie curry on the menu so we've been busy stocking up on biltong to add to the mix. After that we will no doubt wonder down to the waterhole to see if we can spot any hungry lions seeking out their prey. Hard life.



Apparently this park has at least two well known stories, firstly that at one of the waterholes 8 lions took down a rhino. How would ...

... seen some very cool things. We saw black-faced impala, which are only found here, and two Namaqua chameleons, which are very cool. And Tallulah found a scorpion under the table - a juvenile dangerous one, we think - but she did not touch it and Rob put it out on the rocks far from the lodge. We also saw three huge white rhinos, including a female with the longest horn I have ever seen (about 3 feet!) and a male who kept ...