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We were all up by 4.00am and ready to leave by 0500am, excited by what the day might bring in Kruger National Park. On the hours journey to Orpen Gate Ionna snoozed while the rest of us rested! We arrived at the gate at about 0550am and waited with about six to eight other vehicles to get into the park - the queue behind us grew. Becky who has done this before suggested that while she parked the van I ran out and got in the queue with the money and filled in form to speed up the process. I was third in the queue and as the guy in front had still to fill in his form we were elevated to the be first in one of the two queues. 10 minutes later we were out and off and the queue was now about 20 deep - great tactic by Becky otherwise we would have been 40 minutes or so.
Our first animal was an impala standing next to wildebeest - so Becky and I were joint winners of guessing the first animal we would seen - mine was the impala. Next came a jackal drinking from a roadside puddle followed by giraffe and zebra. Before our breakfast stop we also saw burchells starling, magpie shrike, lilac breasted roller, European roller, yellow billed hornbill, cape glossy starling, leopard tortoise crossing the road, a juvenile african hawk eagle, three hammerkop really chilled standing on a bridge - the closest I have ever been able to take photographs - and Swainson's francolin. At the breakfast stop I got good photos of the natal francolin as we watched white backed vultures and bateleur eagles circling a bit further away possibly over a kill site?.
Luckily for us not long after leaving breakfast we were stopped by a man who said there were wild dog 10km down the Timbavati road - so we headed off the main track and down the dirt road in search of them. We arrived at their location and luckily there only 3-4 other cars there - we stayed watching them for almost an hour - they moved a few yards to another bush , watched waterbuck who watched them and then made off after them only to return a few minutes later deciding they weren't worth the effort and don't taste that good anyway. In total I counted 18 dogs - one in particular looked badly injured down its back leg but the others were looking after it so it should survive. Buzzing from the dogs we made our way slowly towards Satara rest camp and lunch. Enroute we passed a large lake, or dam as its called locally, although it was clear the water levels were receding due to the lack of rain - we watched hippo, crocodile,and terrapin.
Becky regularly checked an app on her phone which told her what people had seen in the park - she noted that earlier a leopard, possibly two, had been seen in the area opposite the dam so we drove across for a look - nothing - then Becky shouted leopard and we quickly glanced across to see a leopard running up a the drainage channel and out of view. As a consequence we waited a while but it didn't reappear so we thought we would go for lunch then check again later on our return trip. Before we got to Satara we did see elephant but they were quite a distance away......our first of the big 5 amazingly.
Lunch was at the Mug and Bean takeaway - a large coffee and half a giant muffin with John. We had a look around the shop but only bought a big bottle of water.
Our afternoon started with a trip to a dam just south of Satara where buffalo had been sighted and sure enough there were 5-6 old males or dugger boys wallowing and cooling themselves in the mud - attended by red billed oxpeckers who were removing their parasites. (NB: when Becky looked at her Kruger app on 9/4 - the lions were on the bridge eating a buffalo so one of them clearly succumbed overnight!)
We then returned to the drainage channels to see if we could see the leopard - we could hear w two leopards mating which explained earlier sightings of two leopards. Then eventually one came into view and walked back along the channel through the thick grass and lay down - it later got up and walked back - I noticed it was on top of and pulling something brown - we realised it had a kill which it was now taking back under a tree to feed on - plonked under the tree it was lost to sight bar its tail and a few spots so we continued our way back to Orpen gate. Above all the leopard action we had a great sighting of two fish eagles sitting in a dead tree.
We watched a big male elephant munching through the bush and later two youngsters mock fighting and sliding down a river bank.
We also saw a single buffalo crossing the road in great sunlight and a dung beetle rolling is ball across the road, a brown snake eagle, hadeda ibis, egyptian geese, steinbok, red billed hornbill, a lovely purple roller, ostrich not far from the exit gate.
We quickly stopped at the shop so the girls could buy a save the wild dog bracelet - to join their rhino and save a child from malaria bracelets - the money pays for the materials, the women who make them and the charity - a third each....what a great idea.
Elephant was the last animal we saw before finally exiting the gate at 5.59pm - we had a minute to spare.
We didn't speed particularly when we noticed the speed trap and unlike the poor car infront of us were not pulled over; they would also get fined for being late out of the park late.
A great Easter Sunday - we made our way happily back to Hoedspruit for a lovely dinner - watching the porcupine again- followed by an early night.
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