Honestly, this is what it was like to wake up with the view we had, we may have sung this every morning during game drives when we watched the sun rise…not going to lie.

Waking up to having our things was the best thing ever. To be able to wear a clean set of underpants, new clothes, brush my hair and wear deodorant was so nice. It was early though, as our game drive left before the sun rose to be able to see as much animal activity as possible.

We actually left earlier than usual., as our guide Jaku, mentioned at dinner that before the rains hit last night…oh shit, I totally forgot to add this into the last post! Well enjoy it now, because we could not get this out of our head for days!

Anyway, so at dinner the previous night, Jaku mentioned that he was on the way to take us to a possible leopard siting (with a kill no less) before the rains hit. So, we set off earlier than normal to see if it was still there, because leopard.

So, at 5am in the morning in the middle of winter, it is cold in the plains of South Africa. Really cold. Our guide had prepared blankets and hot water bottles for us which kept us nice and toasty on top of our warm clothes! After we were all in the car and rugged up like little toasty cinnamon buns, we set off on our first morning safari adventure.

On the way to where the leopard was, we spotted a lone hyena. Apparently the hyena population in Kapama is quite small as there are over 40 lions in the park, which have overpowered most of the other predators. It was unusual to see one by itself though.

Cute huh! And right as the sun was rising.

Just to the other side of the hyena, there were these chill as giraffes just lazing around. Also the sun rose quickly and it was light in no time. Still very cold though.

Unfortunately, the leopard or it’s kill were nowhere to be seen when we arrived at the location. Carlos our tracker found some hyena tracks around the tree and deduced pretty quickly that because of the rains, the smell of the leopard’s kill had attracted the hyenas, and caused the leopard to flee and leave behind it’s meal.

After this we proceeded to drive around the game reserve and came across wilderbeast, a newborn foal of a deer like creature that wasn’t an impala, but I can’t remember the name of, buffalo, elephants, monkeys and one of the strangest displays I have ever witnessed which was 2 male giraffes fighting for dominance. They were hitting each other ruthlessly with the horns on their heads.

I managed to capture a mid head joust. They really were doing damage to each other.

Wilderbeast.

A monkey with the mother of the foal behind it, the foal had scampered off behind the brush.

A herd of buffaloThe matriarch elephant

A baby!

This one was hilarious. He split from the main group to find some different leaves, then just decided to lie down and nap.

Oh, we also stopped for a tea and a snack along the way which was rather lovely to do seeing as how beautiful the morning was.

Speaking of food, as soon as we arrived back to the camp from our morning game drive, it was time for breakfast! This is what we had.

My first breakfast of hot things including chicken livers which were very nice.

My second breakfast helping of fruit, salami and cheese, because why the fuck not!

Geoge’s first breakfast.George’s second breakfast.

George’s third breakfast!

Look, sitting in a car looking at animals from 5am in the morning is hard work, we needed our sustenance :p

After breakfast, we had a bit of a walk around the camp then went back to our villa and napped, because we were on holidays and we could, also we were tired!

Conveniently, when we woke up, it was lunch time! So off we went to the dining room to eat some more!

We had a huge breakfast…so lunch was more subdued. There was roast beef and these delicious pasty type things as well as salad.

I then had a serving of the most amazing cold beetroot soup. I could eat this every day!

George had one of each of the desserts. One was a strawberry mousse, and the other was a milk tart, but served not as a tart.

This guy watched us eat.

After lunch, we walked more around the camp, saw some more creatures and I took photos of pretty plants and flowers before heading back to our room

This little water buck was right outside our room!

After a little more rest in the afternoon, we headed back to the common area to get ready for our afternoon game drive. We saw many animals on this drive, but none more significant to me than the unassuming pangolin. I’ve loved them since I had seen them on a David Attenborough show years ago. They are one of the rare 5 that you hardy ever see in Africa. So much so, that Jaku had only ever seen 5 in his entire 8 year career. And here this little guy was on the side of the road just chilling. They usually curl up in a ball to avoid being eaten, but he was happy to just become a log when we came close. We were able to get super close too! I was the only one with enough patience to snap a pic of his cute little face. It was worth the effort. Honestly, such a highlight for me!

We also saw some Zebra up close.

And some hippos which are the 3 log looking things in the photo above. After watching the hippos bob around for a little, we stopped a little further away for our drink and snack. It was quite funny as the hippos were grunting lots, which made one of the girls in our group scared, so she jumped in the car and stayed hidden in there till we moved on.

We drove around a little more and found evidence of a recent leopard (poop), a Jackel (too dark to take a photo), more giraffe and zebra, as well as a bush baby that was jumping around from tree to tree (also too dark for a proper photo).

It was then time to go back to camp and yup you guessed it, eat again! Given it was not raining, we ate in the outdoor dining area with tables that surround an open fire. There was an amazing selection of food as always. I forgot to take a picture of the soup, but here was what I chose from the buffet.

Elvis also made another appearance which was very entertaining.

Well, a full day of sitting, eating, looking at amazing wildlife and scenery sure had us beat! We had been up since very early and had an interrupted sleep though! So off to bed relatively early, after another bath of course to rest up for one last day of awesomeness at Kapama before we depart for Zimbabwe.