When the mice can’t play....... KTP June 2018

[Mel]

What a wonderful Kgalagadi day

[Lisbeth]

What are you doing under the roof

I love meerkats and also kitty cats

[Dindingwe]

Already 3 caracals in 3 days that must be a record.
The grass seems to be still high and rather green. The rainy season was late, it had hardly begun in January when I was there.
Nice lights, especially in the evening.

[GavinW]

30 May: We move to Polentswa

I know that in previous trips to the Kgalagadi, we have always found the days that we are in transit between camps to be fairly quiet sighting wise.
Not always, but generally.
Maybe because we are on a mission to get to our destination, I’m not sure.

This morning we were up as early as possible, and at sunrise started breaking down our camp.
We probably left camp at about 7.30, 30 minutes after “gate opening” time

We saw pretty much nothing until we were almost at Jan se Draai, when we came across a herd of eland on the right

Eland are really skittish and tend to run everywhere in a big group. I find that really wierd, as they are the largest antelope in Africa, and why are they always so nervous.
This lot were no different, and soon set off on the trot. AWESOME.








One seemed to get separated from the rest of the herd as they trotted off on a mission to the west. We wondered if she would catch up.
I suppose that's what being an eland entails



After seeing the eland, we had a brief comfort stop at Dikbaardskolk, before carrying on to Nossob
Nossob meant petrol, ice and wood for me, and to Debbie owls in the trees




After all the admin we set off to Polentswa, and set up our tent in campsite no1



And a Kgalagadi day would not be complete without the obligatory sunset photo



We went to bed that night wondering what the next section of our holiday would bring....

[Lisbeth]

Awesome eland sighting and the pearlie is lovely

How long does it take to set p camp?

[GavinW]

Awesome eland sighting and the pearlie is lovely

How long does it take to set p camp?

About an hour from start to finish

[Lisbeth]

but you have done it over and over again, so probably a kind of record

[GavinW]

May 31: The juvenile delinquents of Polentswa

We woke to the sound of a truck or something travelling along the main Nossob road, and wondered what was going on.

Once we were up and about we were yet again treated to a spectacular moon set and sunrise
African skies are really in a class of their own.





We were the second vehicle out of the camp that morning, and when we got to the road, we realised that what we had heard earlier, was in fact the grader from Nossob.

Our neighbours had headed south, but we wanted to check out the waterhole first
We got to the waterhole just in time to see a brown hyena leaving after having had its drink.

We waited a while to see if anything else would arrive, until my FOMO took over and I decided it was time to move

We headed south, and just after the Polentswa turn off we saw our neighbours returning in the opposite direction.
OK so maybe we shouldn’t be going south. But we carried on anyway.

We saw where they had turned in the road, easy as it was freshly graded, and the about 500m further on we saw:



A pride of lions on a gemsbok kill just next to the road.



The lions were lying both in and next to the road
Just to show, you never know what lies around the next corner



Part of the pride included two teenagers, one of which took a keen interest in our vehicles tyres



The naughty little brat chased us about 500m down the road before losing interest in our tyres







We eventually returned to the rest of the pride, who were posing nicely for us





Not forgetting HRH being a glutton, as is the norm.





Eventually the Nossob crowd started to arrive, and the cats started to settle down for the morning, so we decided to turn around and go up to Lijersdraai to see what was going on up north

The grader obviously hadn’t gone past Polentswa, as the road was terrible.

We saw nothing, concentrating rather on managing the corrugations, and were disappointed to find that the Lijerdraai waterhole had been moved, and the old waterhole (one of our favourites, especially for hyena sightings) had been closed.

We turned around and returned to camp for some R & R

[Lisbeth]

Brilliant lion photos They all have the tummy full and are very good looking

[Mel]

I'm surprised the lions weren't chase out of the road by the grader Great sighting and great photos too!
It's been some time that we got to see lions so close up.

Love that pearlie from Nossob too

Oh, and what does FOMA stand for again? Something that you fear missing out something elsewhere, I seem to remember.
But not the exact letter