Addo Outings 2017

[Flutterby]

Nice prize...congrats!

You still had some great sightings for not much time.

[PJL]

Our plan was to get back to Wayne's Valley as quickly as possible the next morning, so we were in the park at gate opening which is 6am currently. I'm sure the gate times have changed, as I don't remember spending so much time in the park in the dark (both in the mornings and evenings)



Anyway, we enjoyed the impromptu night drive and my spotlight came in handy for highlighting eyes. We saw a distant caracal and a hyena in the darkness

It was barely getting light when we got to Wayne's Valley, but there was no sign of the lionesses. We spent a good amount of time searching around that area and down to the fire base which is along the Addo heights road and kind of the direction they looked like they might move to, but there was just plenty of general game around. We decided it was worth checking Arizona as Roy & Nomad had been on a buffalo kill there a few days before, but again there wasn't any sign of lions. As we neared the area where the buffalo kill had been there was suddenly movement and dust flying up in the air as four hyena came bounding across the road







As they trotted along, they often had their tails rolled right up onto their backs which is apparently a sign of excitement



Something caught their attention in the grass and for a brief moment they all came together





As the sun began to rise they continued on their way.



It looked like they might be heading over the hill towards the erosion site on Ngulube loop, so we travelled that direction but only saw an eland along the way



We popped back to camp to chill out for a while before a drive up to the main camp for lunch

[Lisbeth]

You can make your own night drive

Great hyena action pics

[Richprins]

Congrats on th eprize, Peej, looks quite larney there!

No food or tea pics?

Shame, man...those buff horns the best you got there?

Interesting area that in the south, looks like cows on a farm?

Oxpeckers! where do they come from?

[PJL]

You can make your own night drive

Great hyena action pics

Yep... makes me think it might be worth investing in a decent spotlight. The torch I have is powerful, but you can get some really bright things these days

Congrats on th eprize, Peej, looks quite larney there!

No food or tea pics?

Shame, man...those buff horns the best you got there?

Interesting area that in the south, looks like cows on a farm?

Oxpeckers! where do they come from?

Thanks RP... sorry no pics of the tea or food but both turned out great

We don't get the really the mega-horned buffalo in Addo in terms of width. Some have much bigger bosses than that chap, but his horns were one of the widest sets I've seen. Maybe it's their lack of disease or something that makes the horns different

Much of Addo comes from farms that were bought up - particularly in the south. So you get areas which do look farm like - even where the hyena were has ridges from previous farm use!

As for the oxpeckers, I'm not totally sure whether they were re-introduced naturally or as some kind of planned thing. I've heard of them being seen for a while now, but this is the first time I've managed to spot them myself

[Mel]

Not nice... you saw hyenas without D



Excellent sighting of an eland - so close

[PJL]

Not nice... you saw hyenas without D

He seemed more concerned about the cubs, so we got away with it

[Flutterby]

Nice morning sightings.

[PJL]

The drive up to the main camp would take us back through Wayne's Valley, so yet more searching for lions was on the cards. Along the way we saw many regulars











The lions were still playing hard to find, so we didn't really stop too much on our way north. At Zuurkop we had a nice coffee break and whilst S was scanning the area she piped up with "That's not a buffalo is it". It was rather hard to see for sure - the blob was about 3km away but we both had a sneaky feeling it was something special



We quickly ducked into the car and zig-zagged our way down to Gorah Loop and just managed to catch this chap before he disappeared completely into the bush



A bit of territory marking....



It was a great spot from such a long way away, and we then trundled down to main camp for lunch with plenty of elephants showing up along the way

[Mel]

You ducked into your car? I'd say you've spent too much time around Bushcraft

What a lucky sighting The one that keeps avoiding me

Well done to S for spotting it