April 11 - Animals!!!!

Our group was divided between 2 vehicles and the drivers communicated when and where

animals were found.  We received a call about a group of elephants that were close to us, so we

hurried over to see them.  There were 8 adults and one "toddler" eating their way through this

area.

Mother and daughter

Elephants eat what they want.

It takes a lot of food to fill up these guys!

Yield to wide loads

And then they were on their way......

When we first came upon this lion, we thought he was dead!  Our guide explained that he is one

of three brothers who had recently killed a buffalo and they gorge themselves for days, then they laze around until they are hungry again.  We watched him for a long time with 3 other vehicles showing up.  Finally he started making a soft, intermittent growling noise, The he lifted his head and made the same noise a little louder.  Our guide said he was probably calling for one of the brothers.  As the growls increased in volume and intensity, we finally heard an "answer", which peaked our lions interest and he rose, looked around at us and started walking towards the noise.  It turned out that the answer was coming from a female who when she saw her Romeo took a submissive stance and the growling continued.  At last she stood and walked away.  He sniffed around where she had been and began following her into the night.  Could there be a wedding in the future????

King of the Jungle????  We were hoping he was still breathing!

Once he wakes up, our lion starts the growling routine

Looking a little more kingly, he finally gets an answer

Now he's off to make a new friend and looked a lot bigger than when he was laying down.  The funny thing was, he never paid a bit of attention to us. You can see a vehicle tire in the upper corner, so you can see how close we all were.