Kruger Round 2

After a busy and somewhat stressful weekend, Darin and another intern, Yolanda, showed up here at Mahlahla. They came on Monday since Susie was leaving on Wednesday and they needed to take her to the airport. Before she left though we headed to Kruger for our second time on Tuesday. We got there around 7 am and the first animals we saw were some notorious impala. We decided to take a different route from when we went with Mandi and headed north. Not long after the impala we saw a fairly large group of elephants on the side of the road. They were busy breaking and eating trees and eventually crossed right in front of us. After the elephant crossing we saw some zebra off in the distance and decided to take a little side road to get a little closer. To our surprise when we got back there we spotted 2 lionesses! They were lying in the tall grass just watching the zebra, hoping for an easy meal. We got up very close to them and watched them for about an hour and a half waiting for the most opportune moments to take pictures. As time moved on the lions didn't so we decided to continue on our adventure. As we left we saw the amount of cars by the lions increase from about 3 to 23. We traveled for quite a ways hoping to get some food and not seeing much of anything. We stopped at a restaurant were we all ordered a bacon cheese burger, I ordered a double. After we ate we walked over to some scenic view points where we watched elephants playing in the water as well as a few swimming crocs. After some time there we were on the road again. We made a couple more stops seeing buffalo, hippos, zebra, and some very cool birds as well. I have to say, since I've come here my interest in birds has increased and I hope to do some more bird watching when I get home. The day was going pretty good, but things were getting late. Just as we thought our day was over we came across what I'd been hoping to see. No more than 10 feet off the road a small leopard was lying in the tall grass. Even with it being so close it was very hard to see. I was ecstatic when it turned its head for a split second so that I could snap a photo of its eyes. We stayed as long as we could, but knew we had to get going. We snuck out before it got too crowded and continued towards the exit gate. We came across one more traffic jam, where there were large amounts of baboons and impala, but we had no time to stop since you have to be out of the park by 5:30. We were a little late getting out of the park, but luckily they let us by with ease. Later that night Susie, Yolanda, and I stayed up and played some pool while listening to music since it was Susie's last night here in Africa. The next morning everyone said their goodbyes and the crew left. 

From this point on I will be extremely busy since we have clients all this weekend and then more coming on Monday for 2 weeks. We will start out with 2 days of hunting up in the mountains and then come back down here for the remainder of the hunts. If I don't get many posts or photos up I apologize, but I will try to do my best. Bring on the hunts!