KTP March 2013 - Now I've had the time of my life... *

[Mel]

♫♪♫ ... No I never seen these things before
Yes I swear it's the truth
And I owe it all to you
'Cause I've had the time of my life
And I owe it all to you

I've been waiting for so long
Now I've finally found you
To mesmerize me
I saw the writing on the wall
As I felt this magical
Fantasy

Now with passion in my eyes
There's no way I could disguise it
Secretly
So I take your offered hand
'Cause you seem to understand
The urgency
Just remember

You're the one thing
I can't get enough of
So I'll tell you something
This could be love because

I've had the time of my life
No I never seen these things before
Yes I swear it's the truth
And I owe it all to you ♫♪♫

(Freely adapted from Bill Medley and Jennifer Warnes)

[Mel]

The starters


A black-headed heron at the waterhole just outside the Twee Rivieren gate.
Never had that as a first sighting before.


A steenbok not much further down the road.
Never had that as a first antelope before.


A leopard tortoise just 4 km outside Twee Rivieren, opposite Samevloeing.
Hadn't seen any of them in October.


A swallow-tailed bee-eater.
Never saw one right after coming into the park before.


A kori bustard mum with little one at Houmoed.
Never saw a young one before.


A female pygmy falcon.
Never saw any so early in the trip before.


A striped kingfisher.
Never saw one in the park or anywhere else before.

Already then I guessed it would be a good time in the KTP.
By now I know...

[Toko]

[Mel]

17/03/2013 – Kieliekrankie towards Mata-Mata and back

After having had travelled for more than 24 hours we took a slow start in the morning which was a good thing as Bennit who had filled in for Willem as a camp assistant because the latter had gone to the cricket, called me around 9.30 am to tell me that one of the barn owls had come back home to the water tanks behind unit 2.



Otherwise this striped mouse kept me entertained because I took me quite some time to get a photo of it as it would run around like mad in the search for food:



Although it was already getting hot, we eventually got in the car and took a leisurely drive up north. What stroke us first was that the riverbed was almost void of any life. And that would remain the same all the way through. We’d find the odd springbok, wildebeest or oryx occasionally but not as much spread out activity as we knew it. The KTP always surprises you and is different every time you visit. But she is always painfully beautiful.

First up – a martial eagle:



The martial eagle marks one of the many kinda first timer things this time around. We have seen so many on this trip like all of our sighting from the previous trips summed up. I’m quite happy about it as I reckon, the martial is an impressive raptor and seeing one will always make my day worth the time.

Next a preening marico flycatcher:



At Kamqua what would become a typical scene throughout the trip:



A black-chested snake-eagle passing by:



On our way back to the camp, we found some lions that had moved right next to the road close to Kamqua. The three of them gave us a look – one at a time, and they took a lot of the latter…







And then carried on at what lions do best after having cuddled up in the deep shade:



While sitting with the lions I had got bored waiting for the lions to lift their heads in order to get a halfway decent picture, so I had scanned the trees around us and was treated with spotting a giant eagle owl:



My first self-spotted on this trip – YAY!

When we got to Kamqua waterhole, the oryx and wildebeest from the morning had moved off. Maybe that’s down to the fact that a spotted hyena had taken refuge in the shade of the concrete wall next to the watertank there. Will spare you the photo – absolute rubbish.

Also the giraffes had moved into the riverbed:



And a juvenile gabar goshawk was resting in the shade:

[Mel]

For the afternoon drive we decided that we would go to Auchterlonie and have a sundowner while waiting for the animals to come to drink. For some reason, Spots & I have grown very fond of that place over the years. I particularly love the looking at the windmill and the museum in the golden hours.

But it wasn’t meant to be a quiet sundowner as this crow kept shouting its head off right next to our car.



Scanning the trees in the vicinity was rewarded once again as I found a pair of red-necked falcon sitting in one of them. Watching them I found a third one buzzing around, but it had forgotten to take its r-i-t-a-l-i-n (the word the forum doesn't like ), so it couldn’t sit still for a photo:



Just as with the martial this morning, the amount of red-necked falcons we saw was amazing. I dare say it even surpassed the amount of these raptors we saw on all other trips together. Dunno how many they were in total as I lost count at some point and I don’t have photos of every sighting because sometimes I could do nothing but watch them when they were skyrocketing after their prey.

On our way back – we were doing 50 as nothing was moving and we were getting tired from the heat – I demanded Spots to stop the car. I had found my second owl! This time a spotted eagle owl. Actually, there were two but the other one was so well hidden I only recognized it when we were about to leave again.



On the dune roads someone was all ears for us:



And in the beautiful light we would even stop for the ever-present kori bustard:



But the best was yet to come! Just in the second last bend before reaching KK camp I saw a movement to my right and once again ordered Spots to a halt. And what did I see there? Yes, yes, yesss! An African wild cat!



What a brilliant day with all the raptors and two different kind of cats and a spotted hyena! We were more than content and started our evening routine: Cold Castle at first, then me preparing whatever is side orders for dinner, then Spots lighting a fire and me having a shower before having dinner, sitting some more to listen to the night sounds and observe the waterhole for what might come.

[JustN@ture]

Great start Mel, the black-chested snake-eagle is stunning love the raptors

[mposthumus]

WOW!! . . . . . did I just say WOW?? . . . . this deserves a double WOW!! WOW!!!! Great stuff Mel

PS: WOW!! WOW!!

[Mel]

Thanks so much for your positive responses,

Lis, BJ, puppy, harrys, Sprocky, Flutts, JN, M-Possie!

Coming up with something of a slower day, but interesting behaviour from some
of the usualy suspect. -O

[Mel]

18/03/2013 – Kieliekrankie towards Twee and back

Another 'late' morning was dawning. Actually, most of them would be throughout the trip. A completely new experience but it helped to relax even more and we never felt like we missed something. But then again, we also felt that we saw a lot despite the many complaints we heard. However, those were more the lion hunters and those were not as omni-present as they had been in October. Even SO and I started to appreciate sightings of them again big time. Anyhoo. Kieliekrankie offered another first for us, not in terms of bird but in terms of seeing it at KK. At black-headed heron at the waterhole. Wonderful!



When we finally got out of the camp we were greeted by a fork-tailed drongo admonishing drivers not to speed.



Then the next pygmy falcon – this time against a beautiful blue sky.



Like the martials and the red-necked falcons before we saw many more than we had done on any other trip. I’d be happy to find at least one. This time around it was more like about 7 sightings of them. Even if not all with a photo. (Once I made SO stop but then another car did so as well and SO started telling the guy about a certain sighting. By the time they had finished their friendly chat, my pygmy was gone. Talk about women chattering too much… )

Just outside TR we checked the waterhole. Glad we did, as we had a hartebeest performing a dance for us.



On the way up again we found a by now already familiar sight at Monro.



The other usual suspects were about to arrive soon as well...



The bestes sighting however marked four bat-eared fox that someone had forgotten to send to bed. It was already 11.30 am! Like I said, the KTP always surprises you. Still, they knew they were tardy for the Late Night Show, so they kept speeding to at least see the end of it. One had been ordered to take care of the snacks.



For whatever reason the oryx were on their heels with the same speed. It was hot - what the flip were they doing?



Another novelty for us – the animal behaviour in general. We have never seen so many antelopes running around and being silly like this time. This is also true for the ostriches that we saw just before we turned back to the camp.



I just love the Kgalagadi!

Seeing that we were still at KK and Auchterlonie just around the corner, we headed there one more time for a sundowner before moving camp the next day. At first, it was very quiet, but then a small herd of hartebeests came walking in - a pleasant change to the ever waterhole-hogging oryx and wildebeests. -O



Alhtough, no waterhole team is complete without either of them



Once the antelopes had moved off again, a tawny flew in. I was really happy about that because there hadn’t been many tawnies around so far despite the fact that you would usually see them in abundance.



Why do they keep walking when they got wings to fly though?



We enjoyed watching the guy for quite some time when all of a sudden the noisy lout moved in and started having a go at the tawny.





Well, he did endure it for some time – but at some point he just had enough, probably being reminded too much of his own wife and blurd off after having felt a bit cornered.



When the tawny was gone, so were we – heading 8 km back to the camp to get the evening routine started in the beautiful light of the setting sun at KK.

[Mel]

19/03/2013 – Kieliekrankie to Nossob

Today we would move to Nossob. Driving the southern dune road remained unsuccessful although I heard through the grapevine that somebody saw a caracal there the next day. Oh well. Wrong place, wrong time for us… At the end of the dune road there is Kij Kij waterhole and many people had seen lions there before. It would be our first but when we got there we only found the usual suspects.



Further up the road I found a white-back vulture sitting in a tree not too far off and while I pointed and focused a second one had flown in.



Arriving at Jan se draai we found, well, oryx and wildebeest. -O



A marico flycatcher asked to have its photo take in a nice setting, so I obliged.



At Kaspersdraai another familiar becoming sight: A jackal with its head in the concrete to reach the fresh water pipe and its bum in the air. I can’t blame them, the water in the waterhole looked brackish for most of them. The heat and lack of rain, I guess.



The drive itself was rather uneventful. Not much to look at. Arriving at Nossob we checked in and were given unit 10C. We instantly liked it as there were hardly any neighbours around and we had an unspoilt view into the bush. The camp laundry next door didn’t bother us too much either as the noises coming from there were barely audible with the rest of the camp’s industrious goings. SO and I had sat for a while when he all of a sudden yelped that there was an owl in the tree. And indeed we had a very lovely neighbour – a giant eagle owl.



The braai inspector was doing his round:



Once we had cooled down it a bit it was time to check what was going on at the waterhole. I was happy to see the secretary as we hadn’t met too many of them yet. Once again something we weren’t used to. On all our other visits we were actually tripping over them everywhere.



And then, of course:



For the afternoon drive SO wanted to go to Marie se Gat (which is about 12 km south of Nossob). I’m not particularly fond of that waterhole as it hasn’t produced much for us whereas many others had seen lots there. Hear the jealousy talking?

On our way down to Marie we saw two cars park on the wrong side of the road just a tad south of Rooikop (a waterhole 4 km south of Nossob). There were two lionesses sleeping underneath the bush. We didn’t feel like sitting with them particularly since we knew that the Nossob crowd would move in soon and the sighting would become a nightmare. We also counted on the afternoon drive dwellers to stay there and us being on our own at Marie. So we moved on. At Marie we got some kudus at least. I enjoy them a lot as you don’t find them at each corner as you would elsewhere.





Obviously the jackals were around again as well, but I’ll spare you the photos…

All of a sudden some oryx came running down the dunes and send the kudus flying.



But the oryx had nothing in tow and the excitment soon settled down again.

Despite the lionesses next to the road some 10 km up the road it was starting to crowded at Marie – someone had seen a lion there that morning and everyone was hoping for him to come to drink – hence SO and I decided to make a move and head back to the camp. Actually we stopped at Rooikop for quite some time and everyone coming back from the lions gave us a pitiful look as if we didn’t know what we were missing out on. Well, SO and I had a good laugh! -O

Back at the camp we checked into the hide again and found a PCG resting at the waterhole. Nice change to the jackals!



But even a jackal made for good entertainment with its attempts to catch a dove.



Once the sunset had surpassed its climax



we were off for the evening routine with one exception: We didn’t stay seated in front of the unit after dinner but went back to the hide. And boy, I am glad we did as we would witness the best sightings of the day and one of the best sightings of the trip! 15 minutes had passed without anything moving in the riverbed when a spotted hyena appeared at the rim of the floodlight. It was very skittish and kept moving forwards and backwards, even close to the waterhole but without drinking only a drop from the precious water. Suddenly it disappeared. And no surprise there: A leopard was coming from the left of the hide moving, stalking a bit and racing after the jackals that were around as well. We couldn’t see anything but dust. When it had settled we saw this:



The leopard, who was ID’ed as Balete, walked off with her trophy, but we wouldn’t have seen the end of this yet!

After the leopard had gone, the hyena returned and finally got its well-deserved refreshment from the waterhole. After that SO & I left the hide on a high – what an action loaded 30 minutes we had had!