sundowner

There we were, in the Mara, and animals were everywhere. We (ShayTay and I) saw a little baby waterbuck nursing. We stopped to take pictures and she (or he, I'll just call her a she) stopped nursing and looked at us. The sweetest little face and the cutest ears. Then her mom walked on and she followed. She had those newborn legs that are so wobbly and knock-kneed and she looked like she may just fall down at any time. We just knew she had to be newly born to be so wobbly. We watched mom walk and baby wobble and then the baby settled down in the grass. The grass wasn't real high but she just disappeared into hiding. Mom continued to walk on as she was eating. We drove over near the baby and took pictures of her curled up in the grass. So, so cute!

We drove on and stopped to take some pictures of olive baboons. One was pretty young and very silly as all little baboons and monkeys are. After awhile we took off again and saw a young lion so we watched him awhile. Our guide, Samuel, was always looking around for other game while we were taking pictures and he pointed out some giraffes behind us. Two adults and a pretty little young one.

Then Samuel pointed out a lioness and two cubs far across the field. We told him we wanted to get closer to them. Meanwhile, the lion we were watching kind of got into a stalk position with his eyes on the baby giraffe. We were between the lion and giraffes and when Samuel backed up to head towards the next lions we blocked his view of the giraffes for a moment and they were further away by then and the lion quit watching them. Cool.

We got closer to the three lions. Not close, just closer. They were coming towards us and we could see them well. Samuel said, "uh oh, the lions are going to find that baby hidden in the grass". Oh, no! They weren't even close to the baby and we couldn't even see the baby (Samuel could) so we hoped they wouldn't find her. Samuel said that lions will hunt in the grass to find hidden babies. That's what they do.

We left the position we were in and went past where the baby was hidden and stopped where the lions would be coming towards us. Samuel was trying to get us to see the baby and it took me forever to find her in the grass but I finally did. Silly little thing picked her head up and her ears were sticking up and very obvious. Then Samuel said "keep your eyes on the baby" and of course I was looking through the camera. Sure enough, I was watching the lions and you could tell when they detected her. A short little sprint and they were there. They grabbed that sweet baby waterbuck!

I shouldn't say "they" because it was one of the cubs that grabbed her. I'm not sure how old the lion cubs were but I'm pretty sure they didn't know how to kill that baby because we watched for quite a while and the baby never died. The cub never even broke the skin. The lioness mom was right there and she didn't pay any attention to the cub and his catch/"kill". We were probably there at least 45 minutes or longer. The cub picked the baby up by her neck and carried her a little way, then he licked on her face, then he acted like he was going to bite the rear end but never did. The cub licked some more, mauled around on her neck, licked some more. He drug her around some more. Like a little dog with a stuffed animal.

There was a large male lion nearby and we drove over to see him. We could still hear the baby "bleating" every now and then and I would look at them through my lens and the baby was still alive. She was still alive when we finally left them but I doubt she lived to see another day.

A day in the life of a waterbuck .. or .. A life in a day

We have another story or two to tell from the trip (9/9/09 thru 9/30/09) so I'll add the Kenya ones here when I get them written up. Sharon, feel free to add to this

The migration was definitely near Governor's Camp when we were there.

sundowner

I shouldn't have put those dates - we were only in the Mara for 4 nights. We left the Mara the morning of 9/29.

spassvogel

Thank you for posting this typical safari feeling which shows the "knife with two edges": a successful hunt and a life which is taken. Excitement and regret. Happyness and sorrow.......

Life in Africa.....as it unfolds

Thank you for sharing!

SV

Lillipets

spassvogel- you said it perfectly!

ShayTay

"Lion school" in its most graphic form! It was hard to watch, but also hard not to. The southern and western Tanzania portion of the trip was great, but the Mara was just unbelievable! The whole Migration seemed to be parked in front of Governors' Camp where we were staying. We didn't just watch game, we watched stories unfold. Sundowner has just told you one of them.

atravelynn

Poignant tale.

twaffle

Looking forward to hearing more about your trip. The Mara sounds like it delivered … again.

divewop

Wow, Cindy...you actually shared part of a trip report! WooHoo!

And I'm not letting Samuel guide any of my friends anymore unless I get to go. I'm getting way too jealous of all the great sightings (and stories) that I never get to see!

aknards

Keep it coming, ladies. I'm counting on my vicarious thrills!

Leely2

Welcome back! Agree with Lynn about the poignancy of your story. And I'd love to read more...

LAleslie

Oh dear. We are days away from booking a Southern Tanz trip and now I think we should have been researching the Mara migration! What a vivid little story.

sundowner

Thanks for the comments! It was pretty amazing to see it all unfold.

Sandy, Samuel and I talked about you a couple of times so you were there in spirit. You MUST plan a trip to go when the migration is there. Unbelievable. The first morning we were there Samuel had other guests so we went out with Moses. He was just as good or better than Samuel. I didn't make a list of what we saw until the 2nd or 3rd morning. Lynn, I was thinking of you and your MM report as I was writing it all down so you were there, too . I'll post it all in a minute. As I said, unbelievable.

sundowner

One morning's game drive
6:30 am Leave camp
6:35 2 young male lions, hippo out of water, many gnu's, hyena
6:43 2 more lions
6:48 Leopard, cheetah and hyena pretty close together. Samuel was very surprised they were all there. The leopard ran into the trees
7:05 Hyena and the balloons lifting off at Governor's and Kichwa Tembo (sp)
7:10 3 lions, yawning (2 good males and 1 female), gazelles, hyenas, hundreds and hundreds of gnu (it's easier to type gnu than wildebeest) and zebras, warthogs
7:25 many Topi
7:28 Jackal on a kill
7:41 Big male lion with big black mane. Beautiful!
7:48 Elephants (we didn't see lots of elephants this trip)
7:54 more elephants
8:00 Lions mating
8:08 Topi afterbirth laying on the ground and then we saw the topi mom and the brand new baby!
8:15 3 more lions, 1 male, 1 female and 1 subadult
8:35 Pee stop (probably behind the car. We didn't search out trees or bushes out there.)
8:37 Warthog with babies
8:40 Mating ostriches!
9:00 Other vehicle that had been looking for leopards since 6:30am and hadn't found them yet.
9:20 cheetah in the shade
9:45 Jackal pair and several eland
10:10 Breakfast stop
10:40 finished breakfast
10:40 Leopard with kill. That's a story in itself .
I didn't write anything else down after this. I think we stayed with her until 12:30 or 1:00. We were "late" to lunch every day

The list above isn't everything we saw. I just wrote down the time I saw them first. We saw many more topi, gnus, zebras, warthogs, etc. I did write down every time we saw lions, cheetah and leopards and elephants.

Treepol

Sundowner,

thanks for this very real and very moving report of life and death on the plains which highlights the bitter/sweet safari experience.

The Mara really did well for you, the game drive you describe above sounds jam packed, and such a huge variety of animals.

Cheers,


Pol

ShayTay

... so you were taking notes back there, eh? That first cheetah was quite cooperative. It hopped up on a termite mound next to the road and posed nicely in the early morning light.

I need to figure out how to post my videos online. The Sony format isn't compatible with most video webwsites, so I think I'd need to do a conversion.

sundowner

Sharon, I can't help with the videos. Sorry! But I hope you figure it out because I would love to see them.

Here's another sighting from the Mara

We left camp with the desire to "find the leopard". The guides knew where a leopard had been hanging out so that's the direction we headed. We didn't drive directly over there but just did a game drive in that direction. Another vehicle had gone straight over there at 6:30 and when we saw them at 9:00 they hadn't found her yet. (I'm very happy to see a leopard but I would hate to waste 2.5 hours looking for one.) At 9:00 we drove around a little while looking and then we went on to find a spot to have breakfast. That took an hour before we stopped because we kept seeing more animals .

While finishing breakfast, Samuel received a text message or a phone call telling him a leopard with a kill had been found. We headed over there right away. There were already 8 or 9 vehicles there (maybe more - I didn't count) and we pulled in to the last open spot. We were on one side of the riverbed and she was on the other side. The riverbed was mostly dry but did have some small pools in the rocks. We could see the kill - an impala - that she had pulled up under the shade of a tree. The leopard was hidden from our view by a big branch of the tree. Other vehicles could see her from their position.


We waited - patiently and hotly - to see her. After a long wait she went down to the riverbed to drink. Click, click, click, click, click, click, click, click, click - many pictures taken of her. She's so beautiful! After drinking she went back to the shade of the tree to rest more. The kill was fresh and she hadn't eaten any yet. Samuel (and the other guides) knew this leopard and knew she had young cubs. She rested another 20 minutes or so and went back down for another drink. Many more clicks. She did not return to her resting spot or her kill. She walked up to our side of the river and walked right past our vehicle! I was standing up looking down at her taking pictures as she walked towards us. I took one picture of her as she was two or three feet away from the vehicle and directly beneath me. Samuel quietly said "be careful" as I took her picture so I only took one and slowly stepped back from the side of the vehicle. Later Samuel told me a leopard jumped in a vehicle kind of by accident but still mauled two people that Flying Doctors had to fly out. I think he said it was last year.

Anyway, she walked past all of the parked vehicles and kept walking across an open area into trees, probably 300 yards away. Samuel guessed that she was going to get her cubs and bring them to the kill. All of the vehicles stayed out in the open area. No one followed her into the brush. I was happy about that. We fully expected to see the cubs shortly. Pretty exciting! I've never seen little leopard cubs.

One or two vehicles had stayed with the kill and we heard them calling to the rest of us that hyenas were coming. Hyenas! They're going to steal the impala! Oh no!!

We (and the other half dozen vehicles) drove back to where we started and all jockeyed for a spot. The hyenas walked down to the little pools of water, around the left side of the tree and upwind of the kill. One drank and the other rolled around in the little pool getting all wet, except his head and face. They stayed down there FOREVER (10 or 15 minutes) and started back up the hill in the same spot they came down, upwind of the kill. They arrived at the top and started walking off. Yay!! They didn't see or smell the kill! The leopard mom and her babies will get to eat!

She was still in the bush so we drove back to where she walked in so we could see the babies when they all came out. Before we could even get back over there we were called back to the kill area because the hyenas were back. Darn! Sure enough, those dreadful hyenas found the kill. Actually one hyena came down and found the kill and started pigging out. The other one stayed at the top of the hill waiting on his buddy. He waited probably 5 minutes and finally went down to investigate. They both ate on the impala awhile and then fought a little and then pulled it apart and drug it off.

We never saw the leopard again and didn't get to see the cubs. End of story.

LAleslie

OK, I'll ask. What the heck were you doing standing up in the vehicle? Samuel let you? Seems foolish. And a leopard jumped in the vehicle "kind of by accident"? Hmmm, am starting to get a bad feeling aboujt this place.

sundowner

LAleslie, the vehicles are the pop top type of vehicles they use in East Africa. And yes, you can stand up and photograph from the open hatches in the roof. There were vehicles from several different camps there and most had people standing to take pictures.

I can't remember what he said about the leopard. Maybe Sharon remembers. It was chasing something or something was chasing it and it jumped into the vehicle. I remember thinking it was probably scared and just jumped into what was in it's way or like it would jump into a tree and then found itself in a foreign place just lashed out. The leopard didn't jump into the vehicle to attack the people.

ShayTay

I can't remember the particulars, either. Samuel said that some leopards are more nervous around the vehicles and people than others. This one was one of Bella's daughters and was fairly comfortable around the vehicles, although she was a bit startled when she first topped the cliff and ran right into a dozen of them. Sundowner had a great shot straight down at her beautiful face when she walked by.

divewop

Great story, guys! Darn hyenas!

LAleslie, I've had Samuel as my guide in the Mara for several years/trips. Let me assure you, he would never let you do something to endanger yourself or others or do anything to tease or entice the wildlife.

There are two types of jeeps used by the Govs' camps (that I'm aware of). One type has the flaps that roll up on the sides, where you remain seated, the other has the pop-up hatches on the top as Cindy described, where you can stand up and rest your camera on the top of the jeep.