Once again, it has been quite a while since I've posted here! It has been pretty hectic since our first few weeks at African Impact as it quickly escalated into busy season, where we had over 50 volunteers at the lodge at one point! We've also been struggling with vehicles as all of them have been throwing tantrums and I've never felt more like a mechanic... before coming here if you'd told me I'd be towing vehicles and fixing tyres weekly I'd have laughed and said you've got the wrong person, but thankfully Bushwise gave me so much information that I can actually help out with these maintenance issues, how cool!
This week we finally have time to take a breath and reflect on what we've been up to over the last few months, and it is surprisingly a lot! I now feel like I'm really getting the hang of this guiding malarkey, starting to know my way around all three reserves a lot more and being able to anticipate where potential sightings might occur. We've had some incredible sightings of elephants, wild dogs, leopards, and many more that would take too long to write about.
One sighting that I will always remember is on the reserve next door, Buffaloland. We were coming towards the end of our drive when we heard another guide call in a leopard sighting over the radio and raced over to join him. When we arrived, he pulled out and let us drive right up to where he had been watching two leopards mating next to the vehicle. As we arrived, the walked onto a small hill in the trees where we still had a great visual of them but it was difficult to get clear photos of them due to many branches being in the way.
Still, I positioned the vehicle so that all of the volunteers could see, and luckily Ryan had joined us on the back that day so I basically threw my camera at him with some settings I hoped would work and gave him a stern talking to say that if he didn't get at least one good picture I'd feed him to the leopards! Thankfully, he got some awesome photos even though the angle was tricky, I'm forever grateful. Especially since we determined that the female was FBL7, the leopard that I was allowed to name and is now called Chitzi, meaning cheese in Shona. This was my first time seeing her in real life, and what an amazing sighting it was! She was mating with MBL11 who is an impressive male so we should be expecting little cheesy wotsits to appear around November time!
A second amazing sighting I was lucky enough to guide for was a pack of wild dogs on a fresh kill. We knew the dogs were around as one of the guides on the reserve was following their tracks. Whilst we waited and the sun set, we relaxed with a black rhino and her calf. The next thing we knew, the call came in over the radio that the dogs had been located, so we raced off to the dam that we had been given as the location, only to find out 10 minutes later that they had told us the wrong dam! So back we rushed to the dam that was about 500m away from where we were viewing the rhinos, when we get the call over the radio that the dogs had chased a bushbuck into the water and had only just killed it on the bank.
Sadly, we missed the kill due to the wrong directions, but as we arrived we were greeted by the amazing sight of the whole pack digging in to the fresh kill right in front of us. I was so desperate to get some great photos, but as I had the photographers on the back of my vehicle it was much more important to ensure they got those great shots. I ended up using the spotlight to create the perfect photo for them whilst trying to one-handedly take photos and videos of my own, so as you can imagine they didn't quite come out as hoped, but being so close to all the action burned the memory in my brain. As my first experience with true wild dogs, I couldn't have dreamed of anything better!
We've also had plenty of elephant sightings at Balule recently, with a few close encounters. This is a great opportunity for our volunteers to watch their behaviour and realise their true strength and deftness when using their trunks to break off branches. A special day for me was on mum's birthday when Ryan and I were taking volunteers to camp at Balule.
Just as we turned the corner to camp we were met with a large breeding herd of elephants walking feeding and moving towards us. We stopped on the road next to our neighbouring farmhouse. The herd slowly walked past to our left, not really batting an eye, before a mother and calf walked right next to the vehicle! Both kept enough distance and were relaxed enough that we didn't have to worry about upsetting them so we sat and enjoyed their company.
However, just after they had moved into the road behind us and we were about to continue on to our camp, two bulls walked into the road in front of us, and one decided to come head on. He was more interested than aggressive, but as he was walking at a fair pace and we had no escape route I wanted to just get him to wait a moment and come a little more cautiously. As you can hear from the video, I started talking to him which got him to pause. When he carried on I just put my hand up out of the window of the car so that he noticed some movement with the sound. This did the trick and he slowly moved to the side of the car. Our volunteers held their breath as he walked past us, but not before he decided to have a good look at those on the back row! Another short 'hey' and he got the message, moving off and following the herd.
As you might be able to hear, after this everyone sighed with relief and the campfire was full of excitement at reliving the experience through videos and everyone's point of view. This is one of the things we live for as guides, being able to share these incredible moments with those who have come for an experience of a lifetime, and it is especially humbling and of value in these tough times that wildlife are facing, not just in Africa, but across the globe.
I only hope that we will continue to share these experiences with our wildlife for many more years to come.
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