CarlaM

In two words...Beyond incredible!

(6) nights at Mashatu Tent Camp
(4) nights at Mala Mala Main Camp

Photos on www.pbase.com/carlam

There are 3 galleries, Pete's Pond, Mashatu and Mala Mala. All are projects "in the works" and I will be adding captions soon. I do have some videos posted on Facebook if any of you are members, let me know.

I must say first, it was fantastic sharing the game drives with KayeN (at Mala Mala) and Sundowner (Cindy) and her 2 daughters. We had the vehicle to ourselves all but a couple drives! What a nice surprise. This was my 2nd trip to Southern Africa.

My flight schedule was LAX-Frankfurt(United)an overnight flight which I upgraded to business class at LAX. An 8 hour layover, got dayroom at the airport Frankfurt Sheraton. Frankfurt-JNB (SAA)arriving 7:30am the following day.

On the way home I flew JNB-Wash-Dulles (SAA)then Dulles-LAX (United)
All flights were on-time or early. I had one checked bag, a carry on duffle and a backpack and everything made it home and back, hurrah! No complaints at all about the flights, food or experiences. I sat next to interesting people on every leg which made the time fly by.

We rented an SUV, Nissan X-Trail, automatic transmission from First Car Rental at JNB airport. I highly recommend this company. It was tight for room with the four of us and all our luggage but we managed. The price was right, $800 for 14 days with full insurance coverage.

An overview of the route we drove was JNB to Polokwane. Overnight at Polokwane. Next day, drive to the Botswana border, leave car at border (secured area), go through immigration and met by our guide Richard. Afke (mans the Africa Wildcam for Nat Geo) from Pete's Pond was also there to greet us and take photos of us crossing the Limpopo River in the cable car. The river still had water flowing which was unusual for that time of year.

It's a one hour drive from the border to Tent Camp. I will write a list of the sightings we saw just on this drive alone, its was mind blowing!

From Mashatu we drove to Tzaneen and stayed at the Hill Top Country Lodge for the night. Beautiful property! Lots to do in the area that you could easily spend more days here.

The next morning drove from Tzaneen through the Panoramic Route to Mala Mala. I highly recommend this drive and would love to spend more time in this area on future trips.

Mala Mala back to JNB with an overnight at the O.R Tambo Southern Sun. Plenty of time the next morning for a nice breakfast, pack and a few hours shopping at Out of Africa before the flight home.

These two camps complimented each other perfectly. They were totally different experiences which I loved both equally. Lots of elephants, cheetah and wild dogs at Mashatu and at Mala Mala, lions and leopards galore, and of course the highlight, those sweet little Styx pride cubs. I died and went to heaven after seeing them. Also seeing the Eyrefield pride and 9 (big) cubs was great after following their lives this past year. And the old guy, the Rollercoaster Male....hang in their buddy! I am pulling for you.

At Mashatu, Richard was our ranger and Justice was our tracker. Can't say enough good things about them.

At Mala Mala, Rob Scott was our ranger and Patrick was our tracker. Outstanding pair!

My head is swarming with memories and I will be writing more in bits and pieces as well as work on my photos. I just felt I needed to get this started in some shape or form and thank everyone for your suggestions and advice.

Cindy (Sundowner) will be chiming in as well. I can't wait to see her photos. She had some very impressive camera equipment and was so generous letting everyone at the have a go at it. Talk about "lens envy"! &lt

More to come...

CarlaM

Here is a list of the sightings we saw just the FIRST day at Mashatu:

4 cheetahs (3m-1f)
a journey of giraffe (16)
zebras
baby leopard
bat earred fox
steenbok
porcupine (next to our tent)
hyena
warthogs
elands
baboons
giant eagle owl
lilac breasted roller
grey lourie
kori bustard
impala (lots!)
jackals
lions
elephants (one less than 24 hrs old)
white fronted bee eaters
spotted genet
crowned plovers
guinea fowl (hundreds of fleas!)

CarlaM

A few of the special sightings at Mashatu:

Pack of wild dogs on a huge warthog kill. We got their shortly after the kill. A few of the dogs got punture wounds during the kill.

The 2 female wild dogs were denning in the area and we were not allowed to visit the area. Just a couple weeks ago the news arrived that there are 10 pups. Any one going to Mashatu soon is in for a treat.

A 12 ft long python that had been killed by a honey badger. Also nearby another dead 8.5 ft python.

Ardwolf

African wildcat (daytime sighting) sitting under a bush waiting for a rodent to come out of a termite mound.

Cheetah- two separate coalitions (5 of out the 6 days we had sightings)

We kept requesting a Pangolin sighting and all we got were big smiles and chuckles from our rangers~lol!

CarlaM

Very special thanks to all the staff at Mala Mala and Mashatu.

Nils Kure and Tom Bloy were incredible hosts. This camps attention to detail is amazing!

The managers, Aly and Mapula at Mashatu made sure all our needs were met and made arrangements for us to visit Pete's Pond.

Mashatu touched my heart in a way I have never felt. I cried like a baby the entire last day, it was just an experience that is so hard to explain...I will never forget it.

I hope our tracker's (Justice) face has healed after the freak tree branch experience we had on a night game drive.

Thanks to Andrei, the predator researcher at Mashatu. We spent an evening game drive with him and followed a leopard.

On a sad note, one of our guides on our walking safari, Paul Grobler, at Mashatu passed away a couple weeks ago at the age of 40. He had a massive heart attack. He was a big part of manning the Nat Geo wildcam Africa at Pete's Pond as well. It is a huge loss for all and my memories of our short time together will live on forever.

CarlaM

My photos and videos were taken with the Canon S2. I took 20MG of memory cards and an Epson P3000 for backup.

BIG TIP: If you are shooting lots of videos with this camera, this eats up your batteries like crazy. I took 3 packs of lithiums (one will last me a year normally)and went through those fast, had to use some of Cindy's and buy more at the gift shop at MM (that only lasted a day).
On the last day at MM we were about to witness a pride of lions kill a buffalo and I ran out of batteries. You can imagine the words I was using. Unfortunetly we were unable see the kill( we will not talk about it!)and I have learned a huge lesson about batteries.

The Epson P3000 was a favorite purchase (thanks Cindy and TomG). I enjoy carrying it around to show friends and relatives my favorite photos and videos. A terrific gadget!

atravelynn

Welcome back. How nice you teamed up with others from the board.

The Mashatu sightings list is outstanding!

Your other comments on Mashatu are touching. I want to know about the tree branch incident.

So you did this all by driving.

Off to the photos.

atravelynn

Nice picture of Fatty the croc. Looks like there was a little interpack sparing with the dogs. Plus a jackal. You mentioned some of the dogs suffered injuries from the wart hog. Were they ok? I once saw 1 wart hog send 7 wild dogs on their way.

Great cheetah action! Eland & kudu--all the big boys! The 3 baboons near the end are in perfect light, along with that lilac breasted roller. Your bee eater photo was wonderful. I can see why you fell in love with Mashatu.

ShayTay

Wonderful photos, Carla! It sounds like you, Cindy and the girls had a wonderful trip!

Lillipets

I'm so glad to see you've started your trip report.
I agree about Mashatu being a magical place. It's hard to explain, but it you said it best when you said "it touched my heart."
I love the pix!
We saw an aardwolf too, but very briefly-didn't get a photo.
I'm looking forward to more details.
Did you spend time at the hide?
We were there everyday between 11-3.

KayeN

Hi Carla

Have just looked at your photos - just wonderful! I had to laugh at your MM ones, as I have so many exactly the same - it was if I was sitting right next to you! I actually looked at the Hemi ones first - he is so cute!

I am so looking forward to Mashatu in January 2009. Everyone seems to love it and I am sure I will not be the exception! Shame about the poor pythons and I am still amazed that wild dog will take on warthog. One photo that you have questioned as Goshawk, I think it is a Gymnogene, which of course is no longer its name.

And I am green with envy over your African Wild Cat sighting and photo!

I was delighted to be sharing the vehicle with you guys, and I am so lucky that you invited me to join you, as those last days gave me some absolutely fabulous gameviewing, especially of the Styx Pride and their cubs, one of my favourite prides and if I may mention, not the bad mothers that some would have you believe! Not like that Rollercoaster Male, who ran in the other direction with his meal when the Styx Pride Lionesses were fending off those Eyrefield Males.

We were all very lucky with our sightings, and as usual, all it does is make me want to return to see more!

Kind regards

Kaye

cary999

Carla - Thanks for “checking in”, I was wondering about your safari after the “9 months of labor”. Thanks for the tip about First Car Rental, were they are lot less $$$ than Avis do you recall? And good details on your driving route to/from Mashatu.

Glad the Styx pride had some tiny cubs for you. I saw the Eyrefield cubs a year ago when they were that small. So you had Rob as your ranger, me too in Sep 2007. Great guy I know he really took care of you all. And Nils too, he is a fantastic dinner companion with his years at MM and his stories.

Oh, and yes a lot of very nice photos, shows again that it is the Indian not the arrows that counts. But I must say that Cindy’s lens is not an arrow but a war spear I do believe!!!! Nice photo of Paul, rest his soul. The MM Styx cubs were at looks like a buffalo kill, you didn’t see the kill did you? There's Nils also trying Cindy’s lens, Nils is an excellent photographer and has a beautiful book on MM leopards.

Looking forward to more photos and more trip report from you and Cindy.

regards - tom

sniktawk

I will be in Mashatu in 4 weeks time and will reserve my final judgement until after my visit. I am however not encouraged by what you have been told.
If your poicture is supposed to be a baby elephant less than a day old, then it must have been extremely large at birth. The youngster you have pictured is almost touching its mothers belly, a sure sign that is nearly one year old.
Honey Badgers have never been known to kill Pythons as they are far to large, if anyone actually saw this it needs to be reported to researchers. On the other hand Pythons do kill Honey Badgers I have seen it myself at Gorongosa in South Africa, not a pretty sight and very pungent!

skimmer

Ken,

Have a look at the following website:

http://www.honeybadger.com/FactFile/Diet.htm

It seems that they sometimes kill pythons.

sniktawk

Johann

I am most surprised.

HariS

Ken,

Remember the Leopard killing the Croc? Makes me think, anything possible ...... Or your footage of the Tsetsebe going down to the blood brothers, for that matter.

atravelynn

Now for the MM pics. Lots of heavenly, as you described it, pictures of the cubs. I'm sure it was hard to pull away from them. Some fine leopard shots as well! You did well with owls posing.

As for the dead pythons. I was wondering how you knew it was a honey badger, too. Odd, that there would be 2 dead pythons near each other. Were they intact? I would think they'd be at least partially consumed. Or do honey badgers not eat the pythons and just kill them for self defense? (Hope no one reads this with Sunday brunch.)

atravelynn

Skimmer's link indicates pythons are part of the honey badger diet, up to 3 meters!

When provoked, probably anything will kill most anything if it can.

Which reminds me, that was a vicious mongoose photo in Mashatu with its little snout all covered in blood. Not how we often picture them, all cute and scurrying. (Sorry again for the brunch eaters.)

CarlaM

Lynn, we were on a night game drive and the rear wheel on our vehicle ran over the end of a large loose tree branch and flipped it up over the side of the truck, hitting our tracker on the side of his face. It was such a freak accident. He took the next couple days off to go to the doctor and have it checked. Everything was ok but his face was messed up. I was sitting in the seat in front of him and felt the branch on my arm after it hit him. It was startling moment as it was dark and we couldn't tell what hit us at first (or attacked us! lol)

The vicious mongoose is actually licking his chops so the red you see is it's tongue. Kind of a interesting shot but it was still cute as could be.

I have close up photos and videos of the python that are pretty disgusting. You can see where the badger had been eating it. There was a group that saw it on the night drive, we didn't see it until the next day.

Hi Lilipets, I can't wait to hear about your trip. Sorry you had to leave the wild dog sighting. There is something to be said about traveling with game obsessed companions, no need to worry about that with our vehicle. I spent 3 afternoons at the hide. One time by myself and I fell asleep it was so peaceful. The other afternoons we did a walking tour with Paul, downloaded my photos, showered and washed my hair (it was too cold to do it in the am or pm)

Kaye, I almost took a shortcut with my photos and was going to say..."see Kaye's photos from 7/10 onwards". Yes... you would have thought we were sitting next to each other the entire trip! BTW, you have great narration on most of my MM videos, you will have to join Facebook and check them out! I am having trouble with names of a couple leopard photos if you want to help me out. And anything I have mislabeled let me know. We passed by the African wildcat. I asked Richard to back up so I could make sure that is what I saw and sure enough!

I will have to ask the "other" 6 ears if they heard the baby ellie was a day old. I remember Richard saying we can still see the blood on the mother's rear leg that you see in the photos. I will check it out and let you know.

Sniktawk, are you going to Main camp or tent camp? How long will you be staying? So there is a possibility you will see the new wild dog pups, lucky!! IMO, for the price of admission, you can't beat it. I'm not sure how long it will remain affordable for me. BTW, do you live in Africa? I think I read recently that you were at Mapula. Did you write about it or post photos?

Tom, the rental car was alot cheaper at First Car than Avis plus a few others that I compared. The main thing was they had the Nissan and it was an automatic trans which the others didn't offer.

I had to laugh about Cindy's spear! It was certainly a conversation piece. You would have laughed at my expression the first time I saw it. Oh and I did try to buy Nils' Living with Leopards book but he said it is no longer in publication and has been sold out for quite some time. I really was bummed as I wanted to get one and have him sign it.

I was glad I brought my planner along that had confirmations and prices I had booked online. On several occasions there were disputes on the agreed upon prices and I had my papers to back it up so it was never an issue.

aowens

Carla, you are getting me so excited for my trip to Mashatu and Mala Mala in Nov/Dec. I can't wait. I am hoping to see the dogs though I am sure they will have moved on from the den by then. I am so sad to hear Nils book is sold out. I didn't buy it last December and had been planning on buying it this year and having him sign it! Oh well! Your pictures are great!

Lillipets

Carla,
Did I read correctly that you are on facebook with your videos?
I'd love to find out how I can see them.
Thanks!
Lily