The bush

I have just had one of the best weekends in my life!

Early Thursday morning last week C and Frank came to pick me up for our bush trip. We left Pemba at 06.30 and headed towards the Niassa National Reserve and Lucingi Camp. C drove the first half of the distance; 200 km on the highway, which took us about 2 hours. Frank drove the next 250 km, which took us about 5 hours… My neck is still a bit stiff after all the bumping up and down on the dirt roads, full of pot holes and all different big holes you can think of. But I must say Frank is a really good driver! And the scenery is beautiful!

Towards the end of the drive we got a BIG treat => a pack of 10 Wild Dogs that let us come quite close and didn’t hurry to take off. Wow! And even if I knew that was something else I didn’t realize just how rare it is to get such a good look at them. I read later during the weekend that there are only approximately 5 500 wild dogs left in Africa. And I got to see 10 of them!

Arriving at Lucingi, Gordon and Dorothy welcomed us to the camp. It is a very nice camp, beautifully situated on the riverbank with a view over the mountains. We were told that we were sleeping in tent 3 and after settling in we had dinner. The food was great and Gordon & Dorothy’s stories even better. It’s been a while since I laughed so much in one evening. They told us hilarious stories about their lives as cops in London and we had a wonderful night!

After breakfast Friday morning we went to Lugenda, one of the other camps that is managed by Derek & Paula, also very beautiful and a bit more upscale than Lucingi. On the way there we stopped by the river to see if we could spot any Hippos – and we did. There they were; 4 of them lying in the water. We only saw their heads when they came up occasionally for air, but that’s definitely enough. Frank and walked as close as possible but were still probably about 100 meters away. That was exciting!

Coming to Lugenda we met up with Nick and Andrew who treated us with lunch before we went on a game drive. I had to pinch my arm a couple of times to make sure it was for real. This is the truly wild Africa and driving in an open jeep in the middle of the bush is just amazing. We didn’t see that much game going out, but it really didn’t matter because the experience was fantastic in itself. And of course we did see some animals; a Wart hog, Impalas, Bushbucks and monkeys.

For sundowners we went up a really steep hill (I almost thought we would roll over at one point) and had an amazing view of the sunset. Life at its best!

On the way back to camp some exciting things happened; first we heard an elephant trumpeting very close by, but couldn’t see him since it was pitch black. And then we saw a leopard :) my first! So now I’ve seen all Big Five. Unfortunately it sneaked away quite fast into the bush, but I did get a good look at him. And later, on the way back to Lucingi, we actually saw another one! That is almost incredible!

So now I really wanted to see the elephants and crocodiles. I knew there were crocs in the river right outside the camp, but they hadn’t showed themselves to me. Usually they crawl up on the sand bank in the middle of the river to have a nice sun bath, but not when I was in the camp… Eventually I got to see the tip of the heads of two of them but that’s not nearly enough, so I guess that’s one thing I have to come back for.

Because - on Saturday afternoon I got to see an elephant!

We had a relaxed and nice day in the camp and went on an elephant look out at about 4 o’clock. I was, of course, really excited! After driving about half an hour we spotted a young bull. When he saw us he took off into the bush and Derek, Nick and I followed him – by foot!! It took us about 10 minutes before we saw him again behind some trees and now he was only 20 meters away! At that point I was quite happy about the big rifle Derek was carrying because the elephant picked up our scent and was getting a bit anxious. I managed to take a great ;) photo before we slowly moved away from him. He took off the other way and we could safely return to the car. But wow – just imagine that!! My day was made!

Sunday morning we took off and landed back in Pemba around 5.00 pm after a wonderful and adventurous weekend. I couldn’t be happier. And, even if I have suspected it a long time, I can now confirm that I am in love. Totally, wildly and madly in love! With Africa.

I am still uploading pics from Ibo and hope to publish them soon. Then I will continue with bush pics…