Social distancing in the Kgalagadi Oct/Nov 2020

[GavinW]

Friday 13 November 2020


Having spent a good few days travelling the sandy and corrugated roads n the Auob side of the park, we were looking forward to going up the Nossob River again on our first day back in Twee Rivieren.


Waiting for the gates to open, we were presented with this sunrise, with a new moon setting in the west.

The road up to Melvlei was relatively void of any animals, but we were gifted with a secretary bird in gorgeous sunlight

As well as a herd of wildebeest.

[GavinW]

We went as far a Melvlei with not much else to be seen, so we decided to return to Kij Kij and head over the Lower Dune road to see what the lower Auob would provide in terms of sightings.

The dune roads are well known for Korhaans, steenbok and Tsama melons.
We were not disappointed.

[GavinW]

Once over the dunes, we stopped briefly at Auchterlonie before heading north.

We went up as far as Batulama before turning around.

Just south of Auchterlonie, a family of meercats were foraging next to the road.

Our luck changed in between Houmoed and Munro, when we spotted a cheetah under a tree in the riverbed. It was pretty busy sleeping, but did get up to move at some stage of proceedings.

We watched her for a while before returning to camp for the afternoon

[GavinW]

In camp we were joined by this agama

As well as by this starling

[Alf]

Do you lower the pressure in the tyres when driving around there

[Lisbeth]

Yes, Alf, if not you'd not get anywhere Sometimes pieces of the roads are really terrible; or too sandy or too corrugated

Great pic of the irritated Cape Starling Nice cheetah sighting

[GavinW]

Do you lower the pressure in the tyres when driving around there

Yes to about 1.4 bar

[Alf]

Do you lower the pressure in the tyres when driving around there

Yes to about 1.4 bar

So one of those machines to inflate and deflate is a must??

[Lisbeth]

They also do it at the petrol station at Twee Rivieren

(I don't think that KTP is your kind of place, Alf)

[GavinW]

Thanks for all your comments once again.

Sorry, it’s taken a while

For our evening drive we decided to head back to the lazy cheetah to see if she would move off from under the tree.

The cheetah was still there, but after a while she got up, but unfortunately walked up and over the far dunes.

We waited a while to see if she would reappear, but no luck.
We decided to turn around and head back to camp.

We spotted this korhaan no too far down the road

As well as these meercats

And then a lone springbok in the riverbed
We wondered

and turned around back to where we had come from