Southern Africa (and London)-2104: 43. Days 15-18 (Aug 30-Sep 2)

Our main purpose in coming to Manyeleti was to see wild animals in their natural habitat. And while there were a few sightings of animals in camp, for the most part you have to go out to find them. At least you do where we were. Often the animals are found around water but there are few large bodies of water in Manyeleti. (Some camps I know are in trees or otherwise elevated with animals roaming around underneath at night. This is not where we were.)

Now, don’t for a minute think that we went out looking for animals by ourselves. In each camp there are game drives – where you load as many as 10 people plus a driver and a spotter into a vehicle. Now the animals in the game preserve may be wild, but they are not stupid. As Noël Coward noted, only “mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the noonday sun.” Being neither, we went on game drives in early morning and early evening, the traditional times at nearly all camps, which also are the best time to see game.

A typical day starts around daybreak and the wakeup “call” at our camp was the recorded sounds of drums. And this was followed by one of the more civilized customs of the Manyeleti camp – namely they bring you tea, coffee, or hot chocolate to help cushion being awakened. (It appears that this tradition is associated with Manyeleti – another reason to be happy that’s where we were.) We then had about 15-30 minutes to get dressed, have our wakeup breakfast beverage, and stash the remains in the monkey-proof box in our living room. Then off to the vehicle, in our case usually starting out at about 6:30 am.

We had chosen to go on safari in winter. It turns out that there is no perfect time to go. Summer is rainy season and results in very lush foliage. But the lush foliage results in greater camouflage for the animals you’re trying to see. Winter, being dry, results in much more browner and sparser foliage but easier to spot animals both in terms of the foliage and in terms of the drier climate resulting in animals tending to congregate around water supplies. But both winter and summer result in temperature extremes. At least that was what we were told.

Winter is also trickier in terms of Cape Town which has a more Mediterranean climate which means rain in the winter. And then there is the Victoria Falls add-on at the end of the trip. When there is too much water, like the middle of the summer, Victoria Falls can be so misty and booming that the falls are like being drenched in a downpour with little to see. And at the end of the dry season, the falls can be so attenuated that there is little to see. We did hit what I think is the sweet spot at Victoria Falls which we’ll see where we get to that part of the trip.

What I experienced was that it was definitely drier and more sparse foliage but I found it very picturesque (and hope you will too from the pictures I’m posting). However, due to the lack of many significant watering holes on Manyaleti (at least in terms of where we went), there was not a congregating of game around the water – except for one place which we will see. Nonetheless, we saw plenty of game of various types and I am most pleased with the choices we made in terms of timing.

While the morning drive was a bit chilly for many, in most cases a simply fleece or a couple of layers would stave off the cold. And if you really needed it, they had blankets. The drive started by searching out game in an open sided four-wheel drive vehicle (both Toyota Land Cruisers and Land Rovers were used and they were, in my view, indistinguishable). The vehicle did have several poles that supported a canvas roof.

Here is a view looking forward in the vehicle. Notice several things:

View Looking Forward in Vehicle

1) The driver is on the right-hand side of the vehicle since South Africa is a drive on the left country. Of course these vehicles are mainly being driven on dirt paths and sometimes not even that.

2) There is a windshield on the vehicle although it is folded down. When driving at fairly low speeds this does not make much of a difference, and I believe the windshield would quickly get dirty if driving in an up position.

3) There is no gun on the dashboard. Sometimes we came across people from other places whose driver did carry a gun. Ours did not. I’m not sure of the pros and cons in either case. The rules about the game drive, designed for our safety (and probably insisted upon by the liability insurance carriers), require that we remain in the vehicle except where expressly allowed out by the driver. And, when observing dangerous animals, we were not supposed to stand. My own view, based on nothing but having been there, is that so long as we are all in the vehicle, we present to a wild animal as a large, green, smelly animals that is neither food (metal doesn’t taste good) nor danger (since we are only hunting with our cameras). Once you stand, or even more, once you leave the vehicle, you then present as lunch (or maybe just a snack depending on the size of the animal). We were also advised to wear neutral colored clothing and not to wear perfume or cologne. And in some cases our driver asked us to keep silent.

4) There is a man sitting on a chair that sits atop the left front bumper of the car. He is our game spotter. He sits there scanning back and forth looking for signs of game – and talks with our driver (not in English) about what each thinks is a good way to find game. (At least I assumed that is what they were talking about.) Our driver also talks to us at times about animals we are seeing, and the signs or tracks of animals as well. His knowledge about all the animals, including the many different birds, is astonishing and shows the importance of having a knowledgeable driver.

5) The path or road that we are on in this picture is a very high quality track – wide, smooth, and well graded. This is not true of all the paths we were on. The entire area appears to be crisscrossed with all sorts of paths (including some that are whimsical at best). And there is nary a road sign -- except for two or three -- in the entire area pointing the way to one of the camps.

6) You can tell that this picture was taken on a morning ride as our driver and spotter are still wearing warm clothing.

What doesn’t show here is that the vehicle is equipped with a communications radio and the drivers from our set of related camps kept up a fairly lively chatter (again not in a language I could understand although given my hearing impairment it could have been English) usually, we were told, about what each vehicle had seen in terms of game so that we could see as many different animals as possible.

When the special animals (generally lions, leopards, and rhinos) were found, the drivers would keep to a fairly well understood policy of staying out of each other’s way, not disturbing the animals, and sharing the view. I’ve been told that this is not as well practiced either in the more public parts of Kruger nor in Kenya and Tanzania although this is not based on personal observation.

Here is another picture of our driver with our vehicle.

Driver with Vehicle

He was not only funny (at times), friendly, and skillful at finding his way around the game preserve, he was extremely knowledgeable about all the animals – including the many birds – and how best to find them.

Here is a photo showing the shadow of our spotter as we drove along on a game drive.

Shadow of Our Spotter

The spotter had somewhat less English skills but was friendly and seemed to know a lot about animals and especially how to spot them.

Now, let’s talk a bit about positioning within the vehicle. As we’ll see shortly the vehicle consists of 4 rows of 3 seats each, with each row a bit higher than the one in front of it. At first glance it might appear that the middle seat is not very good, especially towards the back of the vehicle.

View from Upper Back of Vehicle

But like many things in life, each position in the vehicle had its pluses and minuses. And the view you get in many cases depends on where you’re looking. One of the problems with being too high up is that the canopy can get in the way of your view. But the height can help you see further. Most of the people did not like to be in the middle seats. While it is true that being so means you’re always looking across someone, if does mean that you can more easily see game on either side of the vehicle. And you can lean forward to improve your view and those to either side of you did not, as a matter of courtesy, lean forward (or at least didn’t do it more than once <g>).

About 1-1/2 hours into the morning game drive, we would stop in a fairly open place and be able to get out of the vehicle. And our driver and spotter would then turn into servers, providing us with a little bit of bread of some sort and hot coffee and hot chocolate.

Setting Up for Morning Beverage Break

Here we see them setting up our morning break. There is a convenient foldout shelf on the front of our Land Rover. This also provides a good opportunity to get a better sense of the configuration of the vehicle. You can see the three rows of three seats each – rising to the back, the canopy, the folded down windshield, and the spotter’s seat. You can’t really see the driver’s seat (and space next to it where one of our party can ride) but it is there.

While you’re looking at this vehicle one question that may come to you is just how do you get into the seats – especially the high up ones. There are different ledges sticking out from the side of the vehicle and you simply work you way up them and then climb into the seats. Several items I read before going on the trip mentioned that you needed to have some agility to get into the game drive vehicles, and that was true but it wasn’t that difficult but did require a bit of agility. I should also mention that there are seat pockets in front of your seat for storing such things as camera lenses, binoculars, or gloves.

After the morning break we did some more game searching and returned to camp around 9:30 am. Then we had breakfast and the opportunity to rest and relax or wander about camp (but not outside camp) until lunch.

Sometime around 3 or 3:30 begins the afternoon/evening game drive. The temperature is the reverse of the morning drive – it starts out warm (or warmish) and by the time the sun goes down and you return to camp it is cooler. Like the morning drive, there is a break roughly half-way for what are called sundowners, or drinks around sundown.

Evening Sundowners

As you can see, it’s the same basic setup although the drinks are now cocktails and soft drinks together with some light appetizers.

Our game driver and spotter are well trained to provide us a good game viewing experience. The driver can give mini-lectures about any of the animals we see. And both the driver and spotter are excellent trackers. Since the vehicle travels at a very low speed (most of the time), the driver is often watching the ground for tracks. Sometimes he and the spotter stop and get off the vehicle to see if they can read where an animal passed through and when.

Looking for Signs of Animals

Then the driver will share the information with us, although we don’t really become good trackers with just 3 days of experience.

Sharing the Information

Sometimes the driver and spotter will go a bit away from the vehicle when tracking an animal. This might look like a casual jaunt but there are wild animals out there (in fact, they’re looking for them – rhinos in this case I think) and our driver and spotter were unarmed. (We occasionally came across another vehicle from another camp where the driver carried a rifle.)