Bush encounters

Very discrete lions

One night, a few of us were round the fire chatting away in the darkness. In the distance we hear a lion roaring…”Don’t worry, that’s miles away.” A few seconds later we hear a second lion respond with a roar… a much, much louder roar and we decide that, well, it’s probably better to go back into the lodge. Turns out the lioness was not even 10 metres away from us. As we shined the torch on her, she was just sat there, watching us.

We saw her again a days weeks later, a bit further away. Almost entirely camouflaged and again, just watching us…

Elephant farts

We camped out in a treehouse one evening, with nothing over us and just a plank of wood below us. At 3am, an extremely loud noise wakes us up. It was an elephant fart. Turns out a herd of elephants was right underneath the tree house. Having a little feast and letting a few go!

Alien tortoises

I met a little leopard tortoise - named Terry to some and ‘Gruyère’ to others - who had a cracked shell and didn’t seem to be able to see properly. I first saw him one morning walking around. Then later that day, by the water pan…and a minute later he’d followed me into the main lodge’s dining area, and he was crashing into walls and tables. I’d never really inspected a tortoise so carefully - turns out they are really really strange looking.

Bush pet

I petsat for the camp manager’s “pet” bush baby - like a mini

racoon/mouse/squirrel/kangaroo/koala type thing called Stitch. He’s extremely cute and jumps all over the place, especially at night. He plays with your fingers and ears and laps up yogurt. He’s got huge eyes and a bushy long tail. He’s got these tiny hands with long fingers and pees on them so that he can better grab onto surfaces and jump around.

Bush horse riding

Another new thing for me has been bush horse riding. A girl that works in a nearby Imvelo camp organises bush horsehides and we’ve been enjoying a few rides. It is an absolute amazing way of travelling through the bush. I’m very slowly getting there but I’m still not quite sure I’d be able to hold on if we bumped into a lion and the horse took off in a flash.

From moths galore to flying ants

We had a couple of weeks with moth infestations. They were everywhere. It was standard to have 3 floating in your glass and swatting at your fork before every mouthful. Even normal to feel a few drips of moth wee during the night. Then from one day to the next the moths disappeared. Then the flying ants came. It was quite impressive. If you take a shower and they land on you, their long wings automatically get drenched and stick to your body - it’s not often I shower with about ten flying ants glued to me.