A Boon With a View - Dimwits Olifants 2018 Mambas Returns Interactive Report

[Klipspringer]

Does that mean that there are two? Because where I went was quite normal and in another position ............if we are still at Mooiplaas

The toilets are next to the parking area

[Richprins]

We were a bit tired after the drunch, so off home for a fiesta, as oom Eddie used to call it!



Then up for the highlight of the day....All Black vs Springboks at Loftus!

The tv wasn't working at the camp, so we set up the laptop in the picnic area...all alone!

Frewells at the controls!

The reception for the dongle was terrible, so we could only watch a few minutes at a time before it froze..

The laptop was fully charged, but with all the messing around, with 2 minutes to go in the game and SA with a slender lead, suddenly...

So we watched the rest on the cellphone, propped up against the laptop screen....we lost too!

Back at home more bad news....this mysterious sight met us...

Turns out a baboon had broken the sugar while we were out!

We assumed that after eating half a kg of pure sugar the baboon would be in Maputo by that stage, but that was cold comfort as we needed coffee the next morning, very important.

So while the Dimwits got supper going I, as Chief Silver-Tongued Negotiator, took it upon myself to go and beg sugar from the neighbours!

I stumbled off into the darkness bearing a small cup, like a slightly-inebriated Florence Nightingale, hoping for the best...

It is amazing how few people have sugar...or there were just too many Auslanders that did not self-cater...

At length I ended up at the fancy guesthouse on the corner, and I am ashamed to say I felt too inferior to knock...

Ready to give up, I spied a small hut on the terrace behind the road, with a topless old man standing on the balcony watching me!

These must be Afrikaners, I thought, and so it was! We struck up a nice conversation. It was a lovely hunter couple from Naboomstroom or somesuch, and they were leaving the next day, so the Tannie sommer gave me their entire sugar stock (a container I still have) and a giant bag of biltong and dry wors, probably worth about R500!

After talking some more to the Oom, and sort of convincing him to watch the Springboks again after years (he is a bit like Harry), I realised that it was tough enough standing, let alone standing for so long with my neck craned back talking upwards, so bid them a fond farewell and returned triumphantly, feeling very manly and successful, I must say!

[Richprins]

The next morning dawned cold and hlaudi!

After coffee with SUGAR we left on a very enjoyable drive indeed, as we had nowhere in particular to go for the day, so just meandered! These are the best drives!

The Olifants Broken Veld biome looks like a nuclear holocaust at the best of times, so even worse in the dry conditions...

[Richprins]

We saw LOTS of hyena on this trip! And they were not messing around, these ones, moving smartly on a mission!

Swarms of swallows at the Bridge again!

Spot the animal!

Homework: Which extremely rare predatory bird does the Olifants High Bridge offer the best chance of seeing in Kruger?

[Alf]

A baboon eating sugar

Then a baboon looking for sugar

[Lisbeth]

Beastly baboons

You know, a lot of people do not use sugar But using it, it is hard to do without especially in the coffee

Also the hyenas look as if they have been under attack

Interesting pic from the bridge with all the swallows/martins and what almost look like "water holes" here and there. So different from the summer view

[Lisbeth]

Pel's Fishing Owl?

[Richprins]

It has to do with the bridge itself!

[Lisbeth]

I see! Standing on the bridge i.e.?

[Flutterby]

I also went begging for sugar at iMfolozi when monkeys stole ours!