Its another LONG drive... 550 kms to Etosha National Park. We are in hills nd mountains for most of it now so its a BIT more interesting at least. Etosha is the home of the lage Etosha Salt an - a 5000 sq km FLAT clay baked pan. The optics around such a flat area really play havoc on you as you can see below:
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| I've got my whole world, in my hands... |
Etosha is more than just the pans. It has a very large scrub area and is home to the big 5 although we didn't see the Leopards this time - but we did get to see some Rhino's up close at the watering hole at our campsite. That was one of the best features of Etosha actually... both campsites had nice swimming pools and then watering holes where we could sit for hours and watch the wildlife come in. We spent hours at each of them spying on Zebra's, Giraffes, Rhino's, Springbok, Jackal's, Wildebeast and various birds. It was quite enlightening to see how timid all the animals were around the watering hole (except for the Rhino's... they were fighting each other). The Zebra's would take about 30 minutes to take the first drink. Clearly, they were very wary about predators - although they didn't seem the slightest concerned about us. They also had bright spotlights on the watering hole so we could watch the action at night - which was when we saw the Rhino's. The camera's had a challenge with it but our eyes worked fine. It was one of the highlights of the trip.
We also saw lots of animals on the plains as you can see below.
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| Hey it's Rusty and the Mrs! |
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| Its a Raptor of some sort... told it was rare to see them. |
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| Just hanging around with nothing to do or to watch.... |
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| Couldn't resist... they are getting annoyed at me now! |
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| Shawn and Bar slip sliding away... |
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| A Bushman's favorite meal - Oryx |
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| They can't out run the bushmen. |
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| There were hundreds of these vultures circling around... no kill in sight |
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| The watering hole at sunset |
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| A Jackal looking for prey |
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| Our trusty Jackals |
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| And at night |
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| The strange two headed antelope |
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| A "Sociable Weaver's" nest... there are actually thousands of them inthere... and it weighs up to 2 tons! I saw them come out in the am... what a racket! |
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| Took them 15 minutes to get this far... |
Thanks for the birthday wishes! Had a good day here celebrating Xmas with Mom and Ger and the kids. Winter has definitely arrived!! What amazing pictures you've taken! Fascinating stuff...keep up the posts, we love to read them!
ReplyDeleteVery cool pictures Brent, thanks for sharing!! Glad you are having fun!!
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