Today is our last day in Kruger.

It was extremely foggy/misty with very limited visibility, which we were told is very odd for here. It took a couple of hours for that to burn off. 

We started out our morning in search of a leopard. I think everyone was on the same hunt. What was found first was a drowsy male lion. He was sleeping near a dam, completely unbothered by us.

Lions live in prides of 4-12 related females and 1-6 males, of which the males tend to be transient over 1-10 years. Our guide said that this male belongs to the pride we saw yesterday with the cubs.

We saw the webs of many tropical tent spiders. They were much more apparent in the mist as they had picked up water particles. The webs are truly tent-shaped with a floor in the middle. The spider hangs out under that floor.

We came upon a family of elephants. They came within feet of our truck as they were grazing. These family groups consist of females and young elephants, with the older males being mostly solitary. This family had 2 “babies” which were relatively young. Two of the adolescent males spent a little while play fighting, which was fun to watch. 

I want to give you some idea of what this area looks like. Since it is winter and the dry season, many of the trees are somewhat bare.

There are dirt roads through the bush, which we mostly spend our time on. This is Hendrick, our tracker.

Sometimes we are on the currently dry riverbed instead.

A little African barred owlet was way up in a tree. These are only 7-8 inches tall, but apparently very loud, according to our guide.

Cute little black bird. I believe it is a Southern Black-Flycatcher.

We very occasionally come across Zebras. They are often with other herd animals and tend to be farther back in the bush and difficult to photograph.

In the afternoon we came across our family of elephants again in another part of the park, as they had walked and grazed over a decent distance during the midday. We also found another group of elephants in another area. One got upset because we startled him as we drover around the corner and he trumpeted at us as we drove off. It was pretty funny, because we had stopped for a little bit and he had calmed down, so he was definitely telling us off. Some others were play fighting agin. It definitely was a good day for elephants.

Our big adventure of the afternoon was unexpected. We were driving along on our usual mission of looking for a leopard when we saw a white-backed vulture that was attempting to fly, but not able to take flight. He was clearly sick, vomiting and unable to control its muscles properly. Our guide called the game warden and arranged for him to come out immediately. In the meantime, our guide and tracker attempted to catch the vulture, which led to our guide getting bitten. When the warden arrived, we (Paul and I were with a couple from Swaziland) got to leave the truck, which is usually forbidden, go into the bush with the warden, and watch the rescue. The warden then took the vulture to a rescue facility for it to get medical care. What they presumed had happened is that the vulture had been poisoned. They said that poachers do that to keep the vultures from exposing their poaching activities.

White-backed vultures are large birds that are considered to be near-threatened.

These are helmeted guineafowl. They are chubby, spotted birds that can flock in large groups. This is just a small portion of this flock.

Nyala with impala. Nyala are absolutely beautiful with their intricate white markings.

Another nyala

Around sunset, we take a break and have some drinks and a snack. It’s a pretty full spread with  coffee, tea, soda, water, beer, wine, jerky, grilled chicken, spring rolls, fresh made chips, nuts, etc. They set up a “table” on the front of the safari truck with a table cloth and everything. After the break, we move on to find the animals that come out in the dusk/dark.

For all 3 nights here we have seen at least 1 civet. Tonight was no different: we saw 2, bringing us to a grand total of 5. They are tough to get pictures of since they are only out in full-dark and they move quickly. They’re really cute, though.

We did have a really interesting find tonight, though. When we are driving in the dark, our tracker shines a light around looking for animals. In one bush, there was a tiny thing luminescing. Once again, I got to get out of the truck. It was a little flap-necked chameleon sleeping in the bush.