The Prince of the Pride

Another epic day in South Africa!  We were delivered to the overnight hide yesterday afternoon at about 3 PM and picked up this morning a bit before 9 AM.  After settling in to our little apartment underground, we set up camera gear in the hide portion of the bunker which was provisioned with comfy wheeled chairs and tripods with gimbal mounts.  The section directly behind the chairs (4 photographers) contains 4 bunk beds where we could (in theory) catch a nap.  Separated by a door was the kitchen area with food, coffee, table and a bathroom.  We had some good action before the sun set including a wary little mongoose, several cape water buffalo and a huge bull elephant.  It gave us all a chance to figure out what lenses would work best as well as shooting angles, etc.

Once the sun set, things were quiet for a time and then we got the buzzer alerting us to the arrival of something.  Which was another huge bull elephant.  The action was pretty good, with breaks of maybe an hour or so between visitors.  Eventually everyone tried to lay down and get some sleep and, other than me, they were all successful.  I just couldn't get to sleep so ended up staying up in the photo hide watching for things.  I watched the sun rise, an unusual occurrence for me these days!

It was a very fun thing to shoot at night with the only light two strips of less lining the watering hole (which was only about 10 feet across).  I experimented with different settings and learned some things that I will incorporate when we are back in the ON hide tomorrow night.

Back to the lodge where we ate a big breakfast and headed back for a 3 hour nap (which I definitely needed).  Then it was time for our afternoon game drive which was epic.  A huge herd of elephants (over 50) were spread out over a valley.  How amazing to drive in among the herd.  We saw babies, males, females and even witnessed a pair of elephants mating which was something to see.  Then on to find the lions - the same two lionesses from yesterday but this time they had the new Alpha male with them. He's a young male who has recently overthrown the prior male.  He's a gorgeous creature and I confess that I felt quite emotional watching him relaxing in the sun.  And because that wasn't enough, we also found two cheetah brothers who were very happy to be photographed.  Have a look at Hillyblips journal to see one of them.  Tomorrow morning we meet at 5:30 where we will be transferred to the Lagoon hide for water birds.

Okay, time for some real sleep for me.

Thanks for coming along!

Debbi