Days 12, 13 and 14

(Rhia’s comments are italicized)

For all those that wanted a food expose in this blog, sorry to disappoint so far. We only ate out once, and the rest of the time we cooked for ourselves with the wonderful accommodations at the Elephant House. As everyone who’s spent five minutes with me knows, I’m not a cook!! But it’s a delight to eat at ‘home’ whilst traveling as restaurant food can become quite taxing. Perspective is such a nebulous thing; at home, I want to eat out; out here, I want to eat at home. One of the staples of our diet is a packet of curry Ramen (not found in the states…but something even I can cook!); they just go with everything. We packed sandwiches every day to take with us into the park, and either stopped at a designated picnic area, or an animal hide. Rhia brought a backpack cooler-bag with insertable freezer packets to keep everything cold. Our hardshell icebox we bought last year was good for car journeys, but we will be flying between destinations this year so needed something more functional. That cooler-bag has already opened conversational doors as one lady from New Zealand recognized it as something bought at Costco. She also recognized my clothes as being from there 😂

Our last two days in Pilanesberg started out slowly. Not to say it was bad, we got to see a LOT of birds! 😃

We had some “almost” sightings.

So we thought we’d share some of the  scenery with you. I’m trying to share more photos of the environment for you to see the total beauty of this fantastic continent. I just sooo love the animals that all I want to do is get close to them. But I’m practicing restraint; it’s never too late, is it???

However, let’s not get silly… perhaps a little bit of restraint is good enough? So I started sneaking in a little hippo, rhino, croc, giraffe etc.

But the park saved the best for last!

And speaking of dangers, the coup de gras of the trip was an elusive feline. We were alone on the road, turning a corner, and Rhia surprisedly sputtered and pointed at …

As we were the sole observers, the leopard was obviously not feeling threatened as she rolled about in the grass and sat prettily. We could not believe our luck! It wasn’t until another car arrived that she got up, walked directly past our car and disappeared into the long grass.

I have two comments to add. Firstly, the fact that the leopard was unthreatened made Dan react in a hilarious way. He was quite insulted that the leopard felt safe enough to show us her belly (as she should have sensed his manliness 😂). Secondly, this was the second time we’ve screeched the car to a stop on this trip; the first time, I asked Dan what he’d seen (thinking it must at least be a lion to have reacted that way) and he replied, ‘That cricket was looking at me funny!’ 🤪  Sometimes I wonder…

Here are some of my favorite leopard photos:

It was a fabulous ending to our tour of Pilanesberg.

As we bade goodbye to South Africa (for now), we decided to treat ourselves to a meal from Wimpies (don’t mock, but this is quite upper-class for us 😂)

We then flew to our next destination:  Maun, Botswana. We were expecting to board a tiny prop plane for the journey, but it ended up being a small jet.

But they did serve us food

And landed us safely at the single runway, international airport in Maun.

We will begin our journey into the Okavango Delta with Frank, our tour guide from last year, so will not be able to post anything for a little over a week. But just think of all the photos we’ll have taken!!!! Until then, be safe. See you soon!!