November 24, 3:30PM, Nossob Camp

Up from an afternoon nap to write a few words before we head back out.  It’s strikingly clear today, and it’s hot.  Gina’s still sleeping and it’d be tempting to sleep more but I’m afraid if I don’t get up and moving, I won’t be sleeping tonight.  Sleep has been very messed up and it’s only now beginning to approach a point where I’m not conscious of the impact of jet lag and sleep disruption.

Yesterday morning I goofed up the plan and got Gina and I up an hour too early (3:30AM rather than 4:30) and we got to spend an hour on the deck in the cool pre-dawn.  We heard a lion very close and he called repeatedly as he moved basically east to west in front of the camp.  There’s really nothing like it and it bode well for the morning drive that lions, or at least this male, were close by.  We bolted out the gate right at 5:30, along apparently with everyone else, and headed south.  I’m assuming there was word in camp that the large pride we’d seen a couple of days ago was south of here so they all just took off in a stampede.  We took our time on the road, which follows a dry riverbed that only flows about once a century when Albie spots, off to the left, a beautiful Kalahari male, laying right out in the open about 500 yards off.  Kalahari males are famous for their full manes that are almost black with a golden fringe around their heads and this was a beautiful guy.  Cars kept passing us, either because they didn’t see the male, or because they were so fixated on finding the large pride that they couldn’t be bothered with one lion.  We stopped to watch because we knew that once the sun came up, he’d be moving along, eventually finding a place with shade.    And he did eventually stand, and begin walking parallel to the road and we slowly began rolling to keep pace.  And he looked like he was going to turn to his left and head up over the ridge away from us but then he turned back to the right and began angling toward the road. 

It was just gorgeous.  The light was beautiful and the lion was walking through a field of three thorn flowers as he slowly moved on a trajectory which looked like it would intersect the road.  Then it was on for us – trying to anticipate where he’d come out so that we could position ourselves to get a head on shot of him walking through the flowers in this beautiful light.  By this time there were other vehicles following the progress of the lion but Albie did a fantastic job of backing the car quickly into position and that beautiful black maned lion moved through the field of flowers and… I couldn’t get a shot as the autofocus grabbed every twig and flower and everything but any feature on the lion’s face, and I couldn’t get to manual focus on this unfamiliar setup before that brief moment was gone and he stepped into the roadbed.

Understand that the base of the KTP is fine sand that extends a couple hundred feet deep.  As they’ve graded the road over the years, it sits about 1 – 2 feet below the surface of the surrounding land.  The lion stepped into the roadway and began walking toward us, followed by a phalanx of other cars.  We continued to back up, giving him plenty of room, hoping that he’d eventually step off the roadway, allowing us a shot at him.  He was walking directly into the early morning light so if we could just get a clear shot it was going to be beautiful. Someone in a vehicle behind us got impatient and jumped in front of the lion at an angle and he stepped off the roadway and walked for maybe 30 yards up at ground level, giving us a perspective at just below eye level with a clean background and so Albie and I finally got beautiful shots of this very handsome lion as he walked and marked a bush before coming back down to the roadway.

It’s probably the best sighting of a male lion that I’ve had yet, and such a beauty he was.  That shot made the whole day and we decided to not get greedy and to let him alone so we sat still in the roadway and he walked by the vehicle, not 5 feet from us and on his way.  We let the vehicles past, and then we were on our way.

A fine Kalahari black-maned lion.  Just a stunning animal.

Kalahari traffic jam

After that, we headed north.  We didn’t see a lot but, after the morning, we weren’t disappointed with that.  We eventually camped out at a waterhole where there have been sightings of jackals catching Namaqua sandgrouse.  And sandgrouse came and went and jackals came and went without much action. 

This morning we again headed north and saw almost nothing, eventually stopping at that first waterhole north of the camp to wait it out.  Again, Namaqua sandgrouse, various doves, jackals. Then a bateleur dropped in to drink water.  He hung around for a while and we got nice take-off shots of that beautiful bird.  This evening we headed south and found the pride of many lions, about 14 or so that we could see, all asleep in a pile under a tree far, far away.  We had to make a decision whether to wait for them in hopes that both they would get up and begin moving before we had to head back to camp AND that if they did move, they would move in our direction, or try and find something else for the evening and see if we could catch up with them in the morning.  We chose the latter.  And saw nothing to shoot.  That’s how it is here.  You really have to just play the odds and be prepared to work for any shot you get.

Bateleur in flight.