Flavour of the Month: February 2014 S65 Waterhole Road

[Richprins]

Thanks, nana!

This really is just a "link" road from the Tar in the south to the Doispane road in the north, which was a dirt road until about...late 1990's? I forget!

Hey, fc! You must remember to nominate someone to do March!

[Pumbaa]

Great choice, flying cheetah,

and although one of our favourite roads in that area and we do drive same quite regular when staying in Skukuza nothing spectacular to report from us here - Well this year we definitely saw a leopard there but it rained heavily and we were surrounded by Safari vehicles so we could only saw a glimpse of same - but the roads leading to that road never let us down

Your cheetah sighting there is extreme awesome and is making me also extreme jealous Brilliant pictures and they posed so nicely for you - Great that you had them all to ourselves for so long as this road is normally packed with cars also in February

[Richprins]

https://lowvelder.co.za/428132/impala-c ... -wild-dog/


Hippo in the waterhole at wild dog kill!

[Flutterby]

[Richprins]

https://twitter.com/i/status/1031459569711689731



Kruger Sightings
‏Verified account @LatestKruger
Aug 20

08:15
Ostrich on the move 30m from the road
S65, 4km from S1
Near Skukuza
Tinged by Don for Love God’s Creation

[Richprins]

Some 2015 pics near the waterhole, by Bushcraft:

viewtopic.php?f=46&t=6134&start=20

A little way down the S65 a chap stopped us and told us about a male lion parking off at N’waswitshaka waterhole which got the enthusiasm going again.
As we arrived we found Gump cooling off at the sighting already.





After around 15 minutes the lion got up and tried to cruise off into the shade, but it took awhile as he had an injured leg.





Gump and I then decided to move on with Gump taking the lead.

As we drove over the causeway, just around the corner from the male lion, I spotted something approaching in the riverbed, but Gump continued on.

After a frantic search for binoculars we identified a lioness walking in the riverbed, so I started flashing my lights at Gump who was nearly out of sight by that time.



Gump turned and arrived as another lioness pulled in with cubs.







My teeth were secretly hanging out because Gump had said “I can’t wait to call you back for a sighting you missed” and now I had called him back for a sighting he had missed.

While parking off and watching we could hear another male lion roaring in the distance and the roaring seemed to be getting closer each time, so Gump decided to duck back towards the 1st male and after a few minutes we decided to do the same thing as they were probably brothers, so they would link up.

As we turned the corner Gump started pointing because the 2nd male had come out the bush.



The male walked over to the waterhole area, parked off for a few minutes and then started towards the shade where the 1st male was, so we took a few pics of him walking and then moved on.

[Richprins]

[Richprins]

Kruger Sightings
‏Verified account @LatestKruger
2h2 hours ago

05:20
1 Male Leopard in tree with a kill and 4 hyenas underneath the tree
S65, 1.3km S of S1
Near Skukuza
Vis 5/5
Tinged by Wiaan & Noena







Kruger Sightings
‏Verified account @LatestKruger
14h14 hours ago

16:45
Leopard on kill with 1 hyena under the tree
“Same location as AM”
S65, 1.3km S of S1
Near Skukuza
Vis varies as the leopard moves
Tinged by Ally

[Richprins]

A couple of pics of the waterhole from last winter:


The "dam".



The trough:

[Richprins]

From Pumbaa, 2015:

As it was still pretty early and far too early to check already in we only stopped for a short body break in Skukuza and also filled up the car only to leave again into the direction of the S65 via the H1-1 as we normally do the drive the other way round we decided today to discover the S65 from this direction and we only drove a couple of meters on that road a car with three young guys raved from a lion sightings of three lionesses in a riverbed. I knew that spot they explained to us but this was in fact closer and nearly at the end of this road.

Another car also from this direction stopped and told us about the lions but the driver topped this with a cheetah sighting who was strolling on that road with some crisscross here and there. Well the cheetah we did not met but the lionesses could not be overlooked and they were sleeping right in the shade in the riverbed of the N’waswitshaka which still carried a bit of water and on the causeway there was plenty of space and gladly this was one of the wider ones so you did not had to clear same when another car wanted to pass and so we positioned our car, switched the engine off and let the cameras do their work.



When we arrived the lionesses were still in sleeping modus and so not much happened and as close to where we parked a larger puddle have attracted some birds and we of course had also fun in watching them quenching their thirst.



All in all it were in total 5 lionesses and this we also could identify when staying a bit longer as when they were in their sleeping position bodies close to bodies you mistakenly noticed only three of them



From time to time one of them lifted her head to check out what was going on, yawned and went back into sleeping modus



and one of the lionesses decided that the place where her sisters were lying was a bit more comfortable or more shady and so she joined them

and luckily also a hamerkop arrived at the puddle which must have been a bit deeper and started to fish



so whilst Timon was capturing the hamerkop I checked out the lions or we did it the other way round.





Whilst the mean infantry in form of the hamerkop was catching one fish after the other (the small puddle must have been full with fishes) her majesties were simply sleeping.



We finally lost count on the number of fishes the hamerkop caught but it were quite a few and as also nothing happened any more with the lions and as also on top we already stayed for more than an hour

viewtopic.php?f=46&t=5578&start=60