Previously Walking with rhinos – Matopo National Park Zimbabwe

Jan 27 Hwange Nationl Park

5 hours on a truck is opportune time for journal catch up and photo sorting. The roads are SO bumpy that it’s not an easy task but I’ve got nothing better to do.

At Hwange National Park we set up tents, had some lunch and headed out for a game drive. The cats were hiding but we saw zebras, giraffes, lots of birds, sable antelope and a whole herd of baboons.

Dinner was an African staple of pap with beef and gravy and cabbage with peanut sauce. VERY tasty!

Jan 28

A bunch of warthogs decided to have a party outside our tent around midnight. They don’t party quietly so there was lots of snorting, grunting and hissing going on. Since I was awake I heard elephants trumpeting and lions roaring far off in the distance. Hwange is not a quiet place at night,

Our early breakfast time of 5:30 am surprised a few honey badgers that ended up running all over the place.

Today’s game drive was a huge success. Along with all the other animals we’d already seen, we added a pride of NINE lions, elands, a few jackals, lots of interesting birds, and a puff adder snake. At one point we stopped on the road to let a huge herd of elephants cross. One big bull decided we were too close and got VERY aggressive, shaking his head and stomping at us. When he started to charge, both Julius and Henry revved their engines and he backed off but didn’t let us out of his sight till we drove away.

Back at camp we loaded up into the big truck and went to see the wild dog sanctuary. That’s when it started to rain. All of us thought of our tents . None of the windows were closed and Sue and I didn’t even have the fly on. We weren’t looking forward to sleeping in a wet sleeping bag.

Mama Florence got many hugs when we returned to find that wonder woman had closed everyone’s doors and windows and even put the flies on the 3 tents without them!!! Our tent was bone dry. 😀

Dinner was gem squash, assorted veggies, corn, steak and garlic bread. My pedometre said I did 17,000 steps while bouncing in a jeep so I was starving. I’m not sure how many calories one burns while bouncing but it feels like it should be a lot 😀