Wednesday 24th March 2010
Wednesdays are the 'find all' days. Each Wednesday the GVI team must find every radio tagged animal in the reserve, cheetahs, the lions and an elephant named Pam. Our guide today was Manie, who arrived earlier in the week. Manie is 6 feet 6 and a cavalier version of John.
Unfortunately we didn't find any of the cats or Pam. The radio trackers are difficult to use and don't give accurate readings as they may be faulty according to the staff. We spent 11 hours out on the reserve and couldn't track anything. Blade, the alpha male lion, was particularly difficult to pick up. We did see giraffes and other elephants, but they weren't our focus. Manie drives quite excitedly and is happy to plough through trees, a stark difference from John who is a self-confessed 'gentle bumbler'.
We climbed repeater ridge again to facilitate signal pick up, this time Manie took us a more difficult route which required some climbing to save time. On our way back we had to climb down a vertical rock surface. I lost my footing and began to slide down the rocks when Manie quite literally grabbed me and stopped me from falling any further. Below me was a rock which I would have landed on feet first and then possibly fallen further after losing my balance. Since the incident I see Manie with a sort of aura around him as he saved me!
In the evening we went on a 'night time bumble' with John and saw impala, which are very common here...as are rabbits.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment