In The Jungle ... the Lion Sleeps Tonight ...

So We Pick Up Where We Left Off ...

I promised a lot of photos - this is a picture fest 

I was in the middle of the previous blog post when the internet died, but tonight we are in Maun, Botswana, and we have decent broadband available.  I will attempt to catch up.

So it's picture time.  The last couple days included some game drives, and some river cruises - for the purpose of finding and observing the animals of Africa.  This took place in Zambia and Botswana.  

These monkeys below were actually just outside our room at the lodge by the Chobe River.  They are active little buggers so you better not leave anything outside your room!  The big guy in the middle was about four feet tall. 

This region has a lot of water, which makes it popular with animals. In this rare shot from the River, you can see an elephant on the shore and hippos in the water.  

 

One of our favorite African critters is the giraffe.  They are so big and unusual, yet graceful and they move in slo-mo, which makes them rather mesmerizing.   This shot captured them with some neighbors. 

 

We actually got to the see - the grand prize of animal viewing, a pride of Lions!  

Often you can spend a lot of time looking for lions without results.   They are not fond of cameras or people, so it's hard to get a good shot. This is the best I could do.  

The first picture shows a large male, with a big dark mane.  The second shows two females.  They were hunting and we just missed a shot of them in a high speed chase of a warthog!

 

 

Of course, this being by the river, there are numerous warning signs to beware of Crocodiles.  We saw several and fortunately they were not super close.  This one is relaxing on the bank of the river.

 

There are a number of large, and small, animals such as Kudu, Gazelles, Springboks, and such, and they tend to run in herds.  This Kudu was big, as big as a horse, and had some seriously twisting horns.   And there were Impalas everywhere, like the one in the second picture below, with a warthog in the background. 

 

 

So we talked about the graceful and elegant giraffe - except when they're drinking water.  They are so tall that the water is a long way down and they have to do the splits to spread their legs enough to reach the water.  It's pretty funny, especially from behind.

 

And you get some amusing views during the day, like this shot of the elephant on shore and the boat in the water.  I thought about making this a caption contest, you know, where you supply a humorous caption for this photo ... but ... 

 

Speaking of hippos, we got a picture of this bad boy in the marsh near the Chobe River.  These guys can weigh up to 3,500 lbs and they can run faster than you think. 

And anyone who follows this blog will not be surprised by yet another sunset photo, but this one has a twist.  We are at the conjunction of four countries - Zambia, Botswana, Zimbabwe, and Namibia.  

So this photo was taken from the Botswana side, as the sun set over Namibia.  Our boat guide explained to us that "the sunset belongs to Namibia, but the view and reflection? They're ours!"

 

So this is not exactly a selfie, but an elephant came into our tent camp this morning and friends of ours captured this moment - with us waving in the background from the porch of our tent. 

 

More to follow soon.  Tomorrow we go to the Okavango Delta for a dugout canoe trip and some hiking.