Day 24 – Bye Mopani, hello Letaba
Day 24 – Monday March 18
See pics here.
AM Drive
We packed up our stuff at Mopani and were out of there by 6:30am. Heading to Letaba, though not taking a direct route such that we would have the chance to drive more roads/tracks in the park AND drive to the border of Mozambique. We saw the regulars along the way – wildebeest, zebra, impalas, and a number of birds. The road we took to the border was pretty rough in parts, but scenic – it started getting quite hilly – Lebombo Mountains (a relatively low range with the highest peak being 776m) run along the eastern side of Kruger, north to south.
We were not far from the border when we came upon a male elephant not far from the side of the road. He was big, and he was alone. This is never a very good combination, because it is these males that can be quite dangerous as they are trying to show who is boss. Unfortunately for us, that is exactly what this male wanted to do. It all happened quite fast – he started shaking his head, and moving closer. At this point Jim already had his foot on the gas, and as he was beginning to drive us away the elephant charged toward us. Now, it is likely that the elephant would have stopped before he got to us, as we have been told that this is what generally happens – they tend to ‘fake’ it. Apparently this happens with other elephants too, not just cars. However, we were not hanging around to find out. Neither one of us wanted to explain to the car rental company why there were tusk holes in the car, nor did we want a hospital trip ourselves (or worse). Adrenaline surge over, we were glad to be away from him. Unfortunately, the road we were on was not a loop – we’d have to go back the same way we came.
Minutes later we were at the Mozambique border – the Giriyondo post. It appeared very quiet, and we were the only car there. We did not drive right to the gates (actually it did not appear to actually be gated) as we had no intention of crossing, but did wave as we turned around and took a picture.
Now we wondered if we’d have that male elephant to deal with on the way back. Luckily, he had moved further into the bush, and was contentedly munching away when we passed him. Phew.
At one point, Jim saw a small, green snake on the road. We’ve actually been surprised how few snakes we’ve seen. Oh well. For some reason however, this day we saw a ton of turtles along the road. We had seen these leopard tortoises before, but today we had seen more than ever.
We made it to Letaba rest camp around noon. Checked into our hut, which was much smaller than our previous one, but still had the comforts of home – bed and bathroom.
We had lunch and went for a walk around the camp. The camp had a few large fig trees, and we quickly realized they were full of birds enjoying the fruit. We found a new colourful bird, the Crested Barbet, among others. We then had a sighting that we likely wouldn’t be able to top…..a Pygmy Kingfisher! Of course at this point we did not have our camera with us (if we had, we probably wouldn’t have seen it!!), but it enabled us to have a really good look at it. It was in a very unlikely spot – it had flown up onto some wires beside a trail in the camp. It sat on the wire for quite some time before taking off. It’s name suits it – it is a very tiny kingfisher, and a real beaut. Luckily we were both able to admire it before it left us. We unfortunately did not see it again.
Day 24- PM Self Drive
Early afternoon we were once again on our way looking for wildlife in the car. We headed for a bird hide, only to be stopped on the road by a beautiful elephant mom and her baby. We gave them lots of space, and watched as they eventually made their way across the road. It never gets old seeing these giants in the wild.
Then, Jim saw something somewhat shiny on the road, stopped and reversed back. He said, “get a load of this”, and Kristin peered out his window. It was an extremely large, metallic looking, grasshopper looking thing, with projections coming off it all over. Needless to say, it was scary looking and big – the size of Jim’s palm. After all, he did spot it on the road while driving. We took some pics of course, and examined it further on the computer later – an armoured cricket. Wow.
The bird hide was typical in that we saw crocs and hippos in the water. Usually, where there are hippos, one usually hears them first before seeing them. They can make some pretty unusual grunting, huffing noises. They spend most of their day under the water, because their sensitive skin cannot be exposed to the sun’s ultraviolet rays too long before getting sunburned. Because of this, hippos must stay submerged in the muddy waters. It seems unfair to the poor hippos that they are mammals and cannot breathe underwater – they are constantly bothered to come up for air which accounts for all the snorting, huffing, bubble blowing, and somewhat disgusting sounds they make.
While listening to the hippo music, we looked over at the rocks to our left, and out walks a klipspringer! Now what the heck is that, you may say. Well, you guessed it if you called ‘yet another antelope’. However, these ones are pretty special. We had been hoping to come across one for some time. They are small, very cute, and live only in rocky areas. They are expert climbers, and appear to be walking on their tip toes as they make their way up and down rock ledges with ease. Their name ‘klipspringer’ literally means ‘rock jumper’ in Afrikaans. There were 3 klipspringers in total, and all seemed as curious about us as we were of them. How lucky are we?!
The hide itself was not very ‘birdy’, however, we did see some fish eagles. No one else came while we were there. The secret of the klipspringers was ours for now.
We covered a lot of ground on our drive, just like always. We always try to take a new route, as to cover as much area of Kruger as we can. Still on a high from our ‘klipspringer find’ Jim suddenly stopped the car and pointed ahead – Ground Hornbills! Southern Yellow-billed Hornbills had become commonplace, and actually had the nickname of ‘flying bananas’ due to their large bright yellow beaks. However, Ground Hornbills are definitely not common; as a matter of fact, they are considered critically endangered in Kruger. Large black birds with large red patches of skin on their face and neck, they can fly, but spend most of their time on the ground. They are very long living (at least 30 and have been recorded up to 70yrs) and only breed once every three years, with a very long incubation (40-45 days) and fledgling period (85 days). In addition to this, the birds are obligate cooperative breeders – younger birds assist the breeding pairs with the young. It has been shown that birds that do not have the experience of being ‘helpers’ are not able to successfully breed themselves. We had seen signs around Kruger stating that if tagged ground hornbills are spotted, then to report them. However, these did not appear to be tagged – at least not that we could see. Got some pics and watched them awkwardly walk/jump around, looking somewhat prehistoric. Another very lucky sighting!
Got back to Letaba camp and made some tea in the shared camp kitchen. Another amazing day!
Kristin
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