okow68

Part of my honeymoon took place at Lion Sands Ivory Lodge in the Sabi Sands Game reserve.

We were there for 4 nights, August 20-24, 2006.

Very amazing experience.

Highlight was definitely watching Leopards mate 2 mornings in a row. As some may already be aware, Lion Sand's territorial male leopard's name is Tumbela. And he's blind in one eye.

I received some very good insight from this forum so I thought I would share some photos.

Thanks to all who helped make our safari experience fantastic.

I hope this link works.

http://www.kodakgallery.com/ShareLan...share&Ux=0

thit_cho

Thanks, excellent photos and the link works.

You may want to drop that link into www.tinyurl.com (which provides a very handy, short url) so you can easily drop that link into emails, posts, etc.

thit_cho

Wow, those are great (the lions on the rocks, the "dancing" lions, look like postcards). Lion Sands should drop some of those on their website -- great marketing tools for them.

cruisinred

Amazing leopard pictures. I also like the one of the giraffes. Thanks for sharing.

sundowner

Great pictures! Those leopards give a new meaning to the phrase "when it's over, it's over"!. Thanks for posting these.

jenn24

Great pictures, thanks for sharing! The leopard shots were really fantastic.


Jenn

Marija

Wonderful! Thanks.

okow68

Thanks everyone.

Getting to the Leopards took some serious precision driving. Both mornings. Thank goodness for gravity.

The Land Rover. Where can't it go?

africaddict

Some excellent photos okow68 !
Can I ask what camera/lens combo?

Cheers
Marc

africaddict

We stayed there in Sept '04. Where we watched a Leopard for 2hrs while she stalked and killed an impala on a night drive. Is Courtney still one of the guides there, okow68?
The rooms at Ivory Lodge are absolutely amazing. Amazing prices as well, I think they are asking R7000 pppn!! We booked ours thru MTbeds and paid R2200 pppn.
A better deal for sure!

Cheers
Marc

okow68

Thanks, Marc.

I had the Nikkor 80-400 (slow and used monopod) on my D2x and the 70-200 2.8 on my D200. For the evening drives I had a 1.4x tele with the 70-200 on the D2x and the 17-55 (2.8) on the D200.

2 and half days in, I dropped the D2x hard and it went completely dead. I had only the D200 for the other day and a half. As upset as I was, I was certainly glad I had a backup camera.

Our first morning was also the first Leopard mating occurence. I wasn't sure exactly how to shoot it, since it was in a valley in very poor light. I didn't bring my flash and I didn't want to increase the ISO too much for fear of digital noise. Hence, the images are slightly blurred.

If I had to do it all over again, I would have increased the ISO and used the flash. I was a newbie to the South African safari. Very bushy, etc. Next time, I will do better.

Yes, Courtney is still a Ranger. Spoke with him in the bar one night before dinner. He's a huge Bruce Springsteen fan.

Our Ranger was Trevor (amazing) and our tracker was Juice (also very good).

We reserved our accomadations directly with Lion Sands and I was very pleased with the rate. The whole experience was truly amazing, even after I dropped my 'A' camera.

santharamhari

Hello,

Some very nice sightings.....mating leopards, active lions, necking giraffe....looks like a fantastic trip. Thanks for sharing your lovely pics with us....

Hari

africaddict

Another Nikon devotee, welcome. I have the D2Hs with similiar lens combo to yourself, ie. the 70-200 VR f/2.8+1.7tc & 17-55
f/2.8. Next time do step up the ISO, both of those cameras will give good results with higher ISO + you can always finish using Neat Image or Noise Ninja to clean up!
Cheers
Marc

okow68

Thanks for the advice, Marc.

Although I prefer to get the shot in camera, I'll have to check out the software.

Regardless, the mating Leopards were extraordinary even when not looking through the viewfinder.

sandi

Great leopards pics... some creative mating there. And those dancing lions, the necking giraffe and those oxpeckers on the rhino... WOW! But, just back at those leopard shots, quite amazing. Thanks.

Toshi

Great leopard pictures! My sightings were limited to tails dangling from trees. I also like how you included people in some of the shots to show how REALLY close you were to the animals.

A trip to Africa definitely makes you appreciate the amount of skill it takes to photograph wildlife. They're moving, you're moving, the sun is never in the right place, there's all that brush, etc. etc.

I hope that you were able to have your D2X repaired. At least you had a backup though.

mytmoss

I have been to Lion Sands twice now and I am going back this summer. Just like the original poster, I too got dancing lions as well as other great shots there. It is my number one place to go to in South Africa.

Links are below

http://www.pbase.com/mytmoss/lions_playing

http://www.pbase.com/mytmoss/lion_sands_2005

One of the lion shots was submitted to National Geographic Adventure magazine and I came in 2nd place.

http://www.pbase.com/mytmoss/image/50041639.jpg

Mike

santharamhari

Mike....very nice!!!