🙂 The pan. Flamingoes. Kori Bustads. Cheetahs! Cheeky Elephant.
🙁 Cheeky Elephant! Potential Poaching site.
Saturday, 9th January 2021: Etosha Pan, Namutoni – Onkoshi (79Km) 30C
Up at 06h30 and decamped in very wet and miserable conditions! Headed towards the sound of hyenas cackling in a frenzy indicated that there were a vast number of them on a carcass…. we fear it may have been a poached rhino as several police and anti poaching vehicles pulled in – we prayed that it was not the mother and calf we’d spent time with in that same vicinity on the previous afternoon 🙁
We spotted a dik-dik Mother and baby on Dik-Dik drive which is where Caitlyn has seen the leopard take an impala when she was last here – very special. Dik-diks only stand about 30–40 centimetres at the shoulder, are 50–70 cm long, weigh 3–6 kilograms!! STUNNING sighting!!
Headed back for breakfast to receive message from Swiss and Frenchies to say that they had spotted cheetahs 10mins from camp! We raced over to the pinned location and managed to see them! (Exchanged details to stay in touch.) Spotted the two cheetahs who popped up every now and again from where they were resting under a tree. Not great photos but still very excited to see cheetahs!
Headed towards Onkoshi Camp – the drive is so spectacular! Even the Maribu stork managed to look really attractive!
Amazing blue crane couple on their nest!
We stopped to admire the vastness of the Pan.
Saw our first warthogs of the whole trip!!
Flamingoes arrive in the thousands with the rains to breed here – so excited to glimpse the first arrivals of the season!
We encountered a journey of giraffes – the males were engaging in some ‘necking’ as there were clearly females of interest in the group.
and blue cranes on their nest – just stunning. We had to stop every few metres to take photos – so sad that we lost all the good pics!
We had just been commenting that we had not seen any elephants for two days when this little family graced us with their presence!
Stunning camp on the pan. Arrived at 13h15 and enjoyed lunch.
Lay by the lovely pool with a view over the pan until another big storm rolled in.
Rushed inside to wait for the torrential rain to pass. Decided to have a nap – the rooms are also lovely.
Set off at 17h00 for another game drive. Found the herd of ellies again… Stayed with them for 30mins – running late so had to head back at pace but unfortunately a young bull was having none of it – had a face off until he finally relented and let us pass!
Dinner was fine and we had an early night feeling sad that this was our last in Etosha Pan for now.
Go Back to: Namutoni
Go To: Okonjima
