Safari: Chobe Day 3
Our third day at Chobe – another full day there – was spent in pursuit of elephants. Mike, our guide, warned that it might be a bit of a goose chase because of the clouds and possibility of rain. Elephants need water every day. During the dry season, they trek to the river each day to drink and bathe. However, they prefer their watering holes, since they are less vulnerable there. Once the rains start, the elephants know that their watering holes will soon have water again. At the end of the dry season, when the weather is cloudy and there are sprinkles in the morning, the elephants walk to their watering holes to see if there is water yet. If there isn’t any water, they have to make the trek to the river – 10 km away.
On our quest for elephants, though, we did find other animals. First thing, we found some zebra.
Including this little one. Our guide guessed that it was less than a month old. Note how long its legs are. Mike said that the baby zebras have long legs to help confuse predators. It’s harder for them to tell the young from the older zebras from just a quick glance.
We continued to see more baby impalas, too.
Next, Mike took us to where he knew a pair of lionesses had cubs. His hope was to get there about the time they would call the cubs out of hiding to exercise them. We drove around the area a bit, Mike looking into the bushes where he guessed that the cubs might be hiding. He spotted a couple tiny cubs through the bushes. Eventually I spied one of the cubs, too – it was barely able to walk, crawling over a branch of a bush. Then it disappeared again. I have no idea how Mike knew they were there or how he could possibly have found them.
Then we found the lionesses.
After watching for a while, Mike determined they weren’t going to call the cubs out, probably because it looked like rain. So, we continued our trek to find elephants. We drove to one watering hole, then then to a more distant watering hole. But…this is what we found:
Mike was so frustrated. At one point he just looked around and said, “Where are they?” And then we continued to another watering hole. Still no elephants. So, next we headed toward the the river again. And FINALLY we spied a family.
We followed them to the river, where they got some water.
And just like that, they headed off again.
We returned to where the lionesses were – Mike thought they might call out the cubs in the late afternoon. On the way, we spied some jackals and a warthog with babies.
Then we found the lionesses in about the same place as in the morning.
The then, before long, one of them went and called her cubs.
They ran around, explored, and played with each other for a while.
And then they went back to mama.
And nursed for a little while.
Finally it was time to head back to camp. On our way, we spied this mama and baby giraffe at sunset.
