Day 11 Selous

This morning we wake up to monkeys playing outside the tent and also see a hyena walking by.  At breakfast 4 giraffe come by the lake followed by a few more.  Ron and Nancy ask us if we heard the commotion last night, they blew their emergency whistle during the night.  They heard something rubbing against the tent, thought it was a genet that we had heard about earlier coming to get bugs by the lantern, then discover it is a hyena.  When you blow the whistle the Masai come to help, he came by and scared the hyena away, then they said they could hear him laughing with the other Masai, guess they aren't too afraid of hyenas.  I can't believe we never heard a thing, their tent is only about 50 yards from ours, they have another good story to add to the endless list from this holiday.



Lake views from our tent this morning

So fun watching them drink, they always flip their neck up and lose a lot of the water

 We are also introduced to a buffalo spider that is hanging out in the main bar area at breakfast, this we should blow the whistle for Sean tells us, Nancy says she has already seen one in her bathroom. Glad these things are happening to them not us. 

Buffalo Spider beside tip box

 This morning we start off with what was supposed to be a 2 hour boat tour, 3.5 hours later we get back.  So pretty on the water this morning.  We see giraffe drinking, elephants crossing, lots of laughs at birds picking up one stick to show off what great nest builders they are.  At one point our guide Ayoub needs to jump into the water because it is so shallow we get stuck, this is the same water that is infested with crocs, you could not pay me to jump in there.  Lots of amazing water birds, all in all a great morning.  It was great to have Ayoub as our guide again on the boat, and if possible I think the morning tour was even better than the afternoon one we did earlier this week.

This guy was there to greet us at the beginning of our boat tour



Open-billed Stork

Squacco Heron

Grey Heron

African Spoonbill

Pied Kingfisher

So many Pied Kingfisher today

Pied Kingfisher in flight

Golden Weaver

Malachite Kingfisher

Giant Kingfisher

Golden Weaver

Brown-hooded Kingfisher

Goliath Heron

Black-crowned Night Heron

Cattle Egret

Black & Little Egret

Black-crowned Night Heron

Sacred Ibis

We got stuck trying to get closer to the elephants.  Can't believe he got out in this crocodile infested water!  He did look around often!

Pink-backed Pelican

Great White Pelican

African Fish Eagle

Black-headed weaver

Juvenile Brown-Hooded Kingfisher

Juvenile Brown-Hooded Kingfisher getting a meal



Grey Heron trying to attracting a mate, look how well I can provide for you, I have a lovely stick.  We had great fun watching this behavior



A panoramic view of just how many birds there were at the end of the lake

Zoomed in

Zoomed in more

Lunch today is in camp at 1pM, first day we have not had a boxed lunch.  Some down time after lunch until our afternoon drive at 4.  I had a much needed nap, it is so hot here it exhausts you.  Tried to work on the blog, but couldn’t get my netbook booted up.  Then some excitement as the elephants are back in camp so we can't move from our tents.  Ron and Nancy are met by Masai that walk them around the back to our tent, then we hear a jeep come up the path and it picks everyone up that is still in camp to take us back to the main lodge to start the safaris.  Lots of excitement, you never know what is going to happen next.



Our tent for 5 nights

Bathroom part of tent

Indoor/outdoor shower.  No idea if the hot water tap worked, we only ever used cold!

Trying to work on the blog

Too many distractions, elephants are back in camp!

Masai come to our tent to escort us around elephants

We start our afternoon safari off by going just outside camp and watching the elephants that have just come through camp work eat their way towards the water.  We stop at a pair of saddle billed stork, none of us are picking up cameras, Zack asked if we had seen these already, we thought maybe this morning on the lake tour, then he tells us they are quite rare, so we now have about 100 pictures of them I am sure.  (As I've updated this blog I see that we have seen them a few times)

Saddle-billed stork

 

Carmine Bee-eater

So many!

So many many!

White-fronted bee-eater

Blue-cheeked bee-eater

 Next stop is at a huge termite mound that Zack tells us would be 20 years old, it is very tall.  We then have a lesson on termites again, by now we should be experts.  I think he was really just passing some time until it cooled down so we could go and find some lions that were found this morning and hope that there is some action.

We get to the lions shortly before 6.  This is a small pride of 4 lions called the Mdonya pride, they do finally wake up and go to the water for a drink.  A German couple that sat with us the last 2 nights at dinner had stayed with these lions for 3 hours this morning hoping they would get up, and then for another 2 hours tonight, just to see them go and drink water.  Wow, much more patience than we would have I think.

Mdonya Pride - 4 females

Time to wake up!

Amazing light again

 

3 jeeps from Mdonya watching the lions.  1 was a drive in, you can see the differences in the 2 styles of jeep

These 4 Bohms bee-eaters back at camp, it was pretty dark by now so hard to get a good picture, so adorable cuddled all together

 Dinner tonight, fish for Ron is substituted for chicken, coconut pie for Andre is substituted with creme caramel so everyone is happy.  Off to bed now at nearly 10PM, hoping everyone gets a good nights sleep, including the hyenas.

Dinner under the stars again, with Masai watching over us and the fires burning