A visit to Kruger National Park with many special sightings!…

Today, Ken took this playful elephant baby photo. What a fantastic shot!

“Sighting of the Day in the Bush”

Ken’s photo:  A Southern Carmine Bee-Eater they spotted today in Kruger National Park, the first sighting for him and Linda.

Today, my plan had been an entirely different topic than our visit to Kruger this morning. Not only did we take off for the park now that the holidaymakers mainly had left the area, but Linda and Ken and Rita and Gerhard had also done the same.

The baby elephant is at play with family members.

We prefer to go into the park on our own since it’s never easy taking photos from the back seat of a standard car.  Besides, experienced self-drive enthusiasts each has their particular way of searching for wildlife and routes they prefer to take.

As it turned out, we met Rita and Gerhard for lunch at the Mugg & Bean for a delightful lunch and conversation, as always. By the time we returned to the house, Linda and Ken were already sitting on the veranda working on their photos from the day’s self-drive and offered to include several of their photos for today’s post.

There were six giraffes in this particular tower.

With company coming for dinner (friends of Linda and Ken’s) at 1700 hours (5:00 pm), the two are preparing and cooking the meal. I was left with 90 minutes to complete today’s post, about one-third of the time I usually spend.

I’d taken over 100 photos today, and the time required to go through all of them would occupy the entire 90 minutes I had allowed to get this uploaded. Thus, I’m doing the best I can and apologize for any brevity and errors in my haste.

Elephant family crossing the road with a few babies protected by the parade.

With only 27 days remaining until we leave Marloth Park, we may only visit Kruger National Park a few more times. Today proved to be a special day with several good sightings and the lack of tourists in the park.  

Unfortunately, obstructed by vegetation, it was challenging to get good photos of the five lions we spotted near the entrance to Crocodile Bridge. This may have been five of the notorious Verhami Pride.

Although there would be three or four vehicles jockeying for position at notable sightings, overall, traveling through the park was easy. After stopping and staying so long at the lion sighting toward the end of the day, we realized we needed to get the show on the road and get back.

The dinner guests will arrive in less than 30 minutes, and I need to shower again (another hot, sweaty day) and make myself presentable for the evening on the veranda.

In a hurry to get back to the house to do today’s post, these were the best we could get of this pride of lions.

Over the past 48 hours, we’ve been bombarded by biting flies. I can’t type more than a few words, and I have to stop swat flies, hornets, and wasps away from my sweaty face.  But, as they say, TIA, aka “This is Africa,” and that’s the price we pay to enjoy such wonders as we’re showing here today in our photos.

In the next several days, we’ll include more photos from today’s trip to Kruger and a fascinating story for tomorrow when I’ll have more time to be more detail-oriented.

Have a spectacular day and evening, wherever you may be.

Photo from one year ago today, January 18, 2018:

Tom is quite a history buff and is particularly fascinated with older structures. For more photos of Recoleta, please click here.

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