Safari Adventure Comes to a Close

 

We left for our long drive back to civilization after viewing Halali's watering hole one last time. But the trip back wasn't without numerous visits to other smaller watering holes along the way.

One of these inferior watering holes was known for its sightings of leopards, and we made it our first stop. As we drove closer to the watering hole the trees became taller and more lush. It was easy to look around and see how the leopards must love it here. The leaves are dense enough that only little speckles of light shine through on their branches, which would make the leopard's spotted coat be a natural form of camouflage. Leopards could hide easily, unnoticed by the game animals that treaded below. Sadly, I don't have any great pictures of these elusive cats, but the watering hole had a massive turnout. An uncountable number of zebra, springbok, and giraffe showed up as we pulled up beside the hole, and all of them flocked to get a drink.

It was exciting to see all of them together, and it kind of felt like that beginning scene in Lion King.

 

(I will have a link to this video soon)

A male Zebra decided to make a drastic exit, realizing he had been left behind by his herd of ladies. We saw them later by the road as we drove off, Mr. Zebra was still pretty angry.

 

But the Zebra drama didn't end there. We drove by the spot that we had seen lions at again in hopes of seeing them one more time. What we found was a Zebra who had had enough of her annoying comrades.

(link coming soon)

 

We took a bathroom stop afterwards, and enjoyed seeing the white elephants from the fenced in area that surrounded the out house. Of course, the out house wasn't very enjoyable... 

 

On our way out, we passed though Namutoni one last time, and I found out that grilled ham, cheese, and tomato sandwiches are actually really good. Since it was our last trek, we took another detour -called Stinkwater- in hopes of seeing flamingoes, but came up unsuccessful, since the drought had dried up the Etosha pan so we had nothing to see. Or so we thought. The road was covered in elephant poop, which are the size of large rocks. My brother and I convinced my dad to run over them as we drove, and we all cracked up when we heard the huge thud. I mean how many people can say they made a game out of running over elephant turds?!?

 

During the last 10 kilometers, we saw huge herds of zebra, springbok, gemsbok, and wildebeest grazing. We stayed there watching them for a while, realizing that we would be leaving soon. I didn't want to go. Etosha was like entering a whole other world, and it was a place I'll remember forever.

 

We drove out of the park, already planning our next trip here.