Browns in Kruger - August 2014 (JHB Clan)*

[Supernova]

Hi All;

Another thing that I did not I did not mention in the previous post was that on booking in we found that we had been allocated a different unit from the one we booked. We had booked the GC5 and were now moved to a GC6B, this was so that the “Party” crowd could all be next to each other.

[Richprins]

No mercy for Landrover buyers...endless drama always!


Camp staff are not really equipped to deal with late night drunkards, in fact few are!

The proper procedure is for the section ranger to be called in, and escort the offenders out of the Park. This used to happen years ago, and is incredibly effective, but maybe more difficult lately?

This is indeed a huge problem!

[Supernova]

19th Day 4: Satara (S100 - H6)

The next morning, there was no morning drive as we waited for the new Discovery to be delivered, so we slept in and had a late breakfast. While we waited, I went to investigate the noise from the previous evening, the neighbours had almost all their chairs for the Guest cottage outside and as Bushcraft has posted and a fire pit (looked like a bird bath).

The fire pit was later collected by the Sanparks staff and when asking them what it was, they stated that it was a fire pit supplied by the Camp Manager ??



We had time to walk around Satara and take a few photos of the local birds.










Granny and Teagy had some time to complete a few word searches and some of the puzzles from Teagys Kruger book.





The new Land Rover arrived at 10h00 as promissed and was followed soon by the flatbed truck to collect our Discovery. The guys from Land Rover advised that the issue may have been caused by something like a mongoose chewing some of the wires in the engine.

When parking the new Discovery at our unit, these little guys headed straight for it and were trying to climb up in the engine. I spent the next two hours running back and forth to keep chasing them away, then came up with a better plan, the only bad smelling thing i could find was a can of toitet spray in the Satara shop. I sprayed the whole can under the car and that kept the mongoose away.





Continued...

[Supernova]

19th Day 4: Satara (S100 - H6)

There was now an evening drive on the cards we had a new car. We left a bit earlier to make up for missing the previous two drives. The idea was to take the S100 out of camp, visit Sweni bird hide and return on the H6.







We had been telling Granny that there would very likely be Lion on the S100, but no luck for lion, there were lots of general game to be found.
We took a stop over at N'wanetsi for all to use the loo and check out the view.



The sun was getting low, so we headed off to Sweni.



At Sweni there were lots of birds, these hides are useually called Bird Hides, but one sees very few birds, this was different.







Even a few Hippo and Monkeys





The stay at the hide was a quick one as we have to head back to camp.



Continued......

[Supernova]

19th Day 4: Satara (S100 - H6)

On the way back down the H6 we can across this little guy in the road, on pulling up next to him we found the family outside their den. They were very friendly and inquisitive, as it was late we spent some alone time with them before moving on.









The rest of the H6 was quiet, so we reached Satara earlier than expected, so too a drive to Nsemani dam on the H7.



At Nsemani, we saw this little baby hippo tying to follow its mother, it was still very young and was struggeling to walk.







The last photo before reaching camp was of this marshal




The neighbours were back !!!

Luckely they were packing there cars for something, one could not help hearing what was going on as everything was said at the top of their voice. They were going to a party somewhere (it was after 18h00 ?), We had an awesome quiet evening, you could hear the same shouting as from the previous evening going on in the distance, but far away enough not to be any disturbance. I could only assume that tonights party was at the Camp Managers house ?

Continued....

[Supernova]

20th Day 5: Satara to Skukuza

Today was the day to head down to Skukuza, so we decided to go for a morning drive before packing up. We first we to Nsemani to look for the baby Hippo



What we found was a pride of Lions in the distance. there was the Nsemani pride at the far end of the dam







After about 10 minutes they started to head around the dam, heading in our direction.



two of the younger males were play fighing





Soon the males joined the pride and all started heading our direction.



The problem now was where to park, so that the Lions would come past us, there were quite a few cars all trying to be in the perfect spot. We chose that perfect spot and the lions emerged right in our path.











They crossed the H7 on both sides of our car and headed off in the bush.











Continued....

[Supernova]

20th Day 5: Satara to Skukuza

After the Lions we continued along the H7 and did the S12 /S40 loop, stopping at Girivana dam to take a few photos of this Saddle Bill catching a small barbel






And on the way back a small Owl.



Teagy was taking pics of her own lion in the back of the car.



We packed and left for Skukuza



At one of the small dams on the way down we came across an interest scene playing out, lioness on the right side of the dam and a warthog on the left.



The lioness started forward stalking the warthog



The Warthog was nervious but not too worried



The Lioness must have realised that she was spotted and gave up after a few tense minutes



That was when we spotted the rest of the pride, they had already made a kill and were chasing each other around trying to get the last of the scraps.





Continued......

[Supernova]

20th Day 5: Satara to Skukuza

At this point we took our own full family selfie....



The rest of the drive down to Tshokwane was relatively quiet, with the odd Ellie, Giraffe and Baboon .







Just before Tshokwane we found another Lion pride on the other side of the dry river bed.





And a little further a Leopard hiding in a tree, there was only a small patch of leaves on the tree and the Leopard had climbed into the leaves.
Tail hanging down



It stuck it's head out once to check on all the cars



We did not stay long and continued down to our place at Skukuza, the GC4V's at Skukuza are still one of the best locations






The evening drive down the H4-1 went unusually quiet, there was the usual general game, but not the Lions and leopards that we often see.

We only went down as far as the N'watimhiri Causeway then turned back to Skukuza, this was when the drama for the day happened.
At Nkuhlu was stopped to check the sightings board, as it was late and deserted, I went first. On reaching the board I heard a screech from the car and saw everyone scatter from the car ?

Cailin came flying past me as I ran to the car, Cailin is a 100 meter runner, so in seconds disappeared to the other side of the car park. I had not closed my car door properly and two baboons had jumped in the driver's seat and grabbed a packet of crisps. Cailin then realised that she was alone in the car park, screeched again and headed back for the car, all the while Granny and Teagy were still sitting in the back seat, the Baboons actually got more of a fright than anyone else and took off with the packet of chips as Cailin was arriving back at the car.

That was enough for the day and headed back for a Braai.



Continued....

[Bushcraft]

Fire pit arranged by the camp manager

No wonder the SPF killed the post without an answer. Ridiculous

I think that hyena den is 8.5km on the H6 from the H1-3

I’m glad the noisy neighbours disappeared for the night. I’m taking a paint ball gun for my next visit to those family units at Satara because there’s always 1 fool in the circle

Super cool lion sighting at Nsemani and then lion with a baby wartie

The family selfie cracked me up

Camouflaged leopard

Those Nkuhlu boons are a problem and we also had them in our car during the last visit

[Supernova]

21st Day 6: Skukuza

The next morning we tried a route down to Renoster koppies and back up to Kruger Gate. on the way to Kruger Gate we drove into a traffic jam



The traffic jam - we had cell phone signal, so checked the twitter feed, which related that there was a Lion kill next to the road.

The traffic jam was caused by an idiot who had parked in front of the kill and would not give anyone else a gap to see the kill. He had a GoPro camera on the front of the car and wanted to sit filming for a few HOURS !!



A police car pulled up and started to direct traffic, the Cop got out the car and told Mr GoPro to move along. Mr GoPro was not happy and eventually moved along with much hand waving and shouting. The Cop did a great job of allowing a few minutes viewing for each car before waving them along - An SA Police controlled sighting in Kruger!!

While this was going on we were all laughing at the sneaky Hyena that was stealing pieces of the kill





It would run down the road in the cover of the cars, so the Lions could not see it, and grab a piece of the kill.



When our turn arrived at the kill we took a few quick pictures and moved on.







Continued.....