What you see in TV documentaries and photos does not do the Okavango Delta justice. What an incredible mind-blowing part of the world. Absolutely stunning.
This tall bird is a beauty and this is the first time I ever saw it’s David Bowie display. Bird life is actually pretty impressive in Africa!
The African jacana is a little water bird that can walk on lillies due to it’s foot structure and lightweight.
Kudus here were not as numerous as at Marataba, but stunning colours. The birds sitting on top of them are oxpeckers, and they have a symbiotic relationship with a number of animals where they help to remove ticks from their host’s bodies.
This bird is always larger than you expect.
My first glimpse of a baby hippo!
Black-crowned night herons with the spotty juvenile.
The stunning vista of our first campsite in Khwai
At our first campsite in Khwai, our neighbours were these little monkeys in the trees above our tents.
Bird of prey lifer. This is a migratory bird that travels from Russia to southern Africa.
This is one of my favourite birds due to the incredible patchwork of colours on this one little creature. It makes an ugly sound for such a pretty bird though!
Sunsets in Africa never get old. Only more beautiful.
The closest I’ve gotten to an adult nile crocodile in the wild!
Summer time is a great time for birding as literally hundreds of different species migrate south at this time of year including this woodland kingfisher which has a beautiful blue colour that flashes by you when it flies.
The largest boscia tree we’ve ever seen!
This southern red-billed hornbill was busy digging in the sand near our tents for food.
We left around midday to go for a drive and came by the river as several waves of elephants came to the river. There must have been 60 elephants in total – wave after wave going in from the right, and leaving to the left. Unfortunately never crossing the river.
During our trails guiding course, we learnt that when you walk in the bush, you must stay in single file – for safety as well as leaving minimal impact on the bush. Was so cool to capture these elephants doing the same thing! Ironic though as the elephant has one of the largest impacts on environmental change (2nd to humans obviously).
Elephants have got to be one of my favourites as I can watch them over and over again and never get tired of them. This little cutie caught my attention as I’ve not often seen such small ones!
I’ve never properly seen these birds as normally they just fly past so quickly!
We followed this lioness after we watched it cross the river. It was amazing to see it scan for food and then try to stalk a zebra.
This young male lion was with the lioness that crossed, but he decided to relax on the other side when he saw the lioness cross the river. Lazy bum!
Love watching these birds of prey everywhere!
Stoffie in Afrikaans means kicking up dust wherever he goes.
Birds typically spread their wings to dry them in the sun when they don’t have preening oils to maintain their feathers. It was so funny to see these pop their wings open just in time to block this elephant walking through. He wasn’t having any of it though!!
I tried to get a better shot but the angle was tough… The underside of this little beetle has black and white markings that look just like a piano keyboard!
These birds of prey have stunning colours
We had such an amazing campsite in Khwai community development trust. We had elephants and hyenas pass right next to our cars/tents at night.
Getting up before the sun has it’s perks!
Watching the interaction of lionesses greeting each other by rubbing their faces against each other is such a heartwarming thing to see.
Wild dogs at the kill. One wild dog takes a nice meaty leg and takes it away! Two others are play fighting. So much to see at this one site – so many hundreds of photos later… incredible
At the wild dog kill site, these vultures and eagle wait their turn
The spotted hyena were circling the perimeter of this kill site hoping to get a go after the wild dogs. They would venture out from the thickets, come and see how it was going and then scamper back as if they knew it wasn’t their turn yet.
December 2016 – Okavango Delta, Botswana
The interactions of these wild dogs was so incredible to observe.
So many game viewers eventually joined our fantastic sighting, including one that fell into a hole. His poor tourist passengers had to help secure the tow rope to the back as the driver/guide wouldn’t get out of the car. Not sure if the nearby predators were scaring him or if it was company policy…
These incredibly ugly and HUGE birds were more numerous here at Khwai than impala. These are two breeding maribous in some form of dance. You can tell they are a breeding pair from the red patch at the back of the neck and the other one has a massive pink crop (difficult to see in this photo).
Such a romantic pairing of these birds!
Love the white target on the bums of these stocky antelope.
Pretty decent view of this hippos dental hygiene! Hippos “yawn” as part of their territorial displays to others.
This elephant was walking along the road as we were approaching (we were headed back to our campsite)
An antelope that lives only around swampy areas. It has strong hind legs to propel itself through the slush. They are bigger than impala.
Some herons are funny looking birds as they tuck in their necks when they walk. The grey heron is not like that and is beautiful and elegant. I love the long grey plumes that dangle down from its neck.
I really wanted to see a black heron after watching that video compilation of animals from BBC with the voiceovers. The black heron is the one that does the “daytime”, “night time” display. Unfortunately it wasn’t the right time of day to see this one hiding under its wings… next time!
View of the Okavango Delta in Moremi Game Reserve. Can you imagine when it floods that our cars would be underwater?
We saw so many new antelope on this trip including this beautiful reedbuck.
During the start of the rainy season so many animals have young with them as the rains means there will be plenty of food for the young ones to garner enough strength to live, and hopefully survive the dry season.
Young animals are so incredible to watch. They can do almost anything adults can do so soon after being dropped from their mothers. Nature in the wild is incredible.
Of the cats I’ve seen (which is now the leopard, lion and genet), the leopard has to be my favourite. And this one in particular was the most AWEsome sighting. We were scanning the bush on the way out for lions that other vehicles had told us about and suddenly to my right as I was driving I saw this thing just by the side of the road. I stopped and looked back and this leopard was sitting by the road and I got to see its beautiful face and green eyes and it was magic. we were so surprised we couldn’t work out whether to get the camera out or get the radio to tell the others or what? In the end it took us so long to do either and the cat just got up and causally walked away so all we could get was this photo of him walking away. He was so beautiful and big and wild. I wish I could give you a photo of his face. It is forever burned in my memory!
A few days earlier we couldn’t pass this road as some elephants were laying down and another big one was guarding them. When we saw them get up later we noticed a tiny little one beside two adults and we concluded one of the mothers may have just given birth to it. Not sure if this was that little one but this one sure was tiny!
Here is my first reed frog before it changed colours
Loving being in the wild.
White water lilies change colour when they have been pollinated. We saw pink and purple ones. Apparently there are also day and night lilies.
Male and female hanging out together.
So awesome to see this little green egg inside a chinspot batis nest. The parents were busy flitting around it.
This is the Angolan reed frog after it has changed colour for thermoregulation in the heat of the day.
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