First out of the Gate at 6:00 am : early morning self drives from Letaba Rest Camp
There is a pattern to game viewing while staying in these camps. You want to be the first one out the gate so that someone else does not scare the game away from the road. It is also nice if you are first when you are traveling down the gravel roads because you don't have to eat someone else's dust!
Over a period of game drives, we developed our own system of looking for game when we saw cars stopped on the side of the road. We first look at the individuals in the car, what direction are they looking and then start looking in that direction. If the game is not immediately apparent, we begin to sector the area six feet at a time. This seems to help because animals like the lion and leopard have not always been immediately apparent.
When we are alone on the road we both are looking down at the ground, up in the trees and also at the road. It is real easy to come up on game near the road and is not a good idea to startle an animal especially a large one like an elephant or giraffe!
On our first official game drive after we entered the park, we got to see an animal we had never seen before; the SPRINGHARE. When we first looked at it we thought we were seeing a kangeroo with a very long furry tail.
The springhare is usually a nocturnal animal, very secretive and not seen that often! We got to see two of them out in the early morning. They hopped out of sight before we could get a good picture of them.
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We have seen a lot of raptors while game viewing in the park. We also have seen several types of vultures including ones that were nesting. Besides raptors we have seen many different types of birds in the area. We have managed to get much closer to saddlebill storks on this trip and have gotten to sit and enjoy their beauty and behavior as they feed.
We usually do an afternoon game drive for a couple of hours. The gate closes at 5:30 right as the sun is starting to set. We have been out most of the day but it seems that the middle of the day is fairly slow as it is in most places. On our sunset game drives we have seen a great variety of animals and birds. We barely catch the sunset before we have to race the gate, but thats part of the fun.
Most camps have a "sunset drive" in a safari vehicle that keeps you out past the gate closing. Some have night drives and early morning drives as well.
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For more on how we travel to places like this , see www.malonetravels2.blogspot.com
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