Ivan Andersen's Photos and Stories

Mechanics and machines!

2012-04-10T08:39:00.001-07:00

What I forgot to mention inmy previous post was that the night before we left Nossob we had gone out for a last game drive in the evening. Whilst on the drive I thought I heard something fall or get caught by a tyre and flicked up into the engine or wheel arch. We sort of looked around to see if there was anything obvious, but did not spot anything.

On returning to the camp I decided to check under the hood. The filler cap from my engine had fallen off! Now I'm no mechanic, but I was sure that it would not be healthy to drive on these very dusty roads around without this cap in place. We were sitting in the middle of the Kalahari, not a spares shop for hundreds of kilometres!

So I took a pair of my underpants, most expendable item I could find and wedged them in place of the missing cap. What else could I do?? We then drove the 8 hours, 5.5 on the dirt roads and 2.5 on tar back to Upington, and back to the same garage that had helped us on our way up when I had discovered the leaking radiator hose.

After about 1/2 an hour of fiddling they managed to locate a second hand cap for me, and for the princely sum of R60, we was back on the road again .... this time to Augrabies.

Our final days in the Kalagadi

2012-03-30T09:03:00.000-07:00

It's been a long time since I've posted here.

Quite scary really when you look back and see just how much time has past, and how quickly the days, months and even years fly by. June 2010 was my last post getting close to two years later! Ouch.

I never finished my stories about our amazing Kalagadi trip. We had five more days on this trip, and we saw many raptors, unfortunately often too far away to get any decent pictures, but nice to see anyway. So we had a fairly quite and relaxing couple of days in Nossob before heading back out of the park to Augrabies. On our last evening drive at Nossob we were treated to this sight:

A Kalahari storm brewing in the distance with a rainbow section to boot!
The following morning we packed up and set out on the long trip back to Twee Rivieren.
Early on we spotted a Kori Bustard striding through the long grass, and a while later a jackal and some vultures cleaning up a carcass form a on kill.

The storm we had seen brewing the pervious evening was still hanging threateningly in the distant skys. It created an amazing contrast with the bright sunlight dirt roads we were travelling on.

As we headed south and west it got closer and closer, and the ambient light got darker, making photography harder.

However I spotted this Abdim's Stork, (Ciconia abdimii) also known as White-bellied Stork, just off the side of the road. A first for us!

I would have hoped for a better shot, but considering the light I was pleased that the shot I did get at least alloed me to get an ID of this bird.

A little further on we spotted (pardon the pun) three cheetahs moving through the grass again unfortunately just a little too far out to get a really decent picture, but here we are:

Then a couple of the slowest inhabitants of the region graced us with their presence. Slow and dignified they made their way purposfully across the road.

The leopard tortiose displaying clearly the variation in colours and patterns.

Then, there was the the pale chanting goshawk, a juveile admittedly, but the bird that had become iconic for us as an image of the Kalahari. Sitting majestically in the top of a thorn tree right along side the road. The clouds had lifted a bit and there was decent light. I was pleased with the pictures I managed to get here. What do you think?

Not the perfect angle I know, but the clarity and proximity of the bird gave me the best chance I'd had all trip.

And that was the Kgalagadi, after a bone-shaking 5.5hrs we left the park and hit the hiway to Augrabies.

All the best, Ivan

On the road to Nossob

2010-06-07T02:34:00.000-07:00

After a leisurely start to the morning we packed up and moved off from Urikaruus around 9am, to head off to our next camp which is to be Nossob. This camp is about 100km from Urikaruus and we anticpated that it would take us the best part of the day to get there.

Not far out of camp we spotted this little mongoose.

Slender Mongoose (Galerella sanguinea), also known as the Black-Tipped Mongoose or the Black-Tailed Mongoose

I unfortunately cut off the tip of its tail in this image, and this was the best shot I got, as this little chap was very busily going about his business and hardly stood still for a moment!

The road between the Mata Mata road and Dikbaardskolk was probably the worst we'd experienced in the park, and in fact turned out to be the worst section we drove on in our entire trip. Sections were so corrugated we really felt like we were getting shaken to bits! But, we weren't about to let that spoil this great trip. You are warned about the roads in this park when you book and at the various camps you are advised to deflate your tyres to as little as 1.2bar, to minimize the impact and both the raods and your travelling comfort!

Next we spotted this black-headed heron sitting on the edge of a water reservoir. It was making an interesting movement with its throat, but did not appear to be making any sound that we could hear.

To be honest by this time I had grown tired of taking photos of springbok, gemsbok and wildebeest and would only take if there was something unique in the shot that we had not seen before. A little while later I spotted a couple of Lanner Falcons sitting on a tree, they were unfortunately a little too far away to get a decent picture of, so I won't bore you with a poor quality image. Then we saw a kori bustard, now we had seen quite a few of this majestic birds, but I still had not really succeeded in geeting a nice clear shot as they seemed quite wary of the motor vehcile and always started to move off as we got closer. Perhaps it was all the rattling and creaking my poor old Sani was developing on these roads? ;-)

Then, at last, we saw a pale chanting goshawk in a thorn tree right next to the road. Now, if you've read my previous posts you'll know I'd been wanting to get a nice clear shot of one of these birds. They had also become almost iconic, at least in my mind, with respect to the Kgalagadi. So here are two of the shots I took.

Then we saw a black-cheasted snake eagle, it was a little too far to get a great shot but I quite liked this one as it shows the starkness of the landscape and the clarity of the sky.

A short while later we saw this greater kestrel, this was the first time we had been able to identify this bird, on this trip, and it was the only chance I got to take a photo of it.

By now we were almost half way through the mornings trip. It had not taken quite as long as we'd expected, but we were feel somewhat shaken and not really stirred! We arrived at the Dikbaardskolk picnic spot and decided to get out and rest a while. As with most of the (human) inhabited spots in the park, this was no different and the yellow mongoose were ever present looking for a tidbit of any sort.

The balance of the trip into Nossob was fairly quite and we did not see much at all. We arrived at the camp at about 13:35, sooner than we had expected, but defintely not sooner than we'd wished after rattling to bits for a couple of hours! (But that's another story)!

all the best,
Ivan
http://www.andersen.co.za/

Urikaruus ... final day

2010-05-31T05:58:00.000-07:00

So back at camp I return to some of my smaller friends again to wrap up our stay at this charming little bush camp. First up my old friend the lady of the lodge, the garden orb web spider. She was still around and there were some interesting developments at the web! At first I did not notice them and was simply busy trying to get some different angles and views of this beautiful spider.

Then I spotted it ... a male had come a-courting! This little fellow was so tiny by comparrison that at first I simply did not see him. Can you?

Well here's an even closer view. Click the image to see it even larger.

Anyway let's move on from my spider fetish for now :-)

Whilst strolling around the camp trying to not get bitten by the very aggressive ants that were everywhere; and it stings when they nip you! I spotted this very well camouflaged grashopper.

Almost impossible to see against the desert sand unless it moves. A little later in the day I saw this somewhat larger member of his greater family.

Much to my daughters dismay it seemed to be heading directly into their chalet via one of the veranda support posts! Due to the cryptic colouring of these hoppers even my camera's auto focus was battling to pick them up nicely!

From time to time I had seen some bright green metallic coloured flies of some sort, but they were flying around so fast and never sitting still long enough for me to get a decent shot that I thought I'd never get something usable. Eventually one of them managed to get itself trapped inside our chalet against the window. It was still quite a challenge to get a photo of it as it simply would not sit still long enough! So after many attempts I managed to get this one which I was quite please with. In fact it won me a second prize in the macro section of the Captured Experiences competition web site.

So here it is ... what do you think?

I was amazed at the colours when I downloaded this image and took a closer look. Can you see the shimmering blue dots on it's back too? Oh, apparently this is a cukoo wasp.

To wrap this post up and our visit to Urikaruus here's my final parting shot :-) another cryptically coloured little grasshopper:

that's all for today.

all the best

Ivan

http://www.andersen.co.za/

Urikaruus, the final episode! (almost!)

2010-05-26T07:42:00.000-07:00

As the morning dawned on our final day in this lovely little bush camp, we awoke to find a number of eagles visiting our small haven as they had at various times over the last few days. There was a tawny eagle far away on the other side of the watering hole, just too far for me to get a useful photo. We decided to go out on an early morning drive this morning, and not long after we left camp we saw this eagle with two fork-tailed drongos in attendance.

We had decided to head off in the direction of the lion kill we had seen the day before to see if perhaps there were now other predators or scavengers nosing around what the lions had left behind. Well we were in for a surprise, the lions were still there! This must have been close on 24 hours after they had originally made the kill. There were a number of jackals nosing around in the area, but they were giving the lions a very respectful wide berth. The wildebeest carcass had ben reduced now down to the head and some bones!

This was one of the every hopeful jackals that were patrolling the area.

As we had spent quite a bit of time with these lions the day before we decided to move on, and were rewarded only a few minutes later with the sighting of 3 secretary birds. Two of them were moving in an area quite close to each other and the third was 20 or 30 metres away from them.

As we were watching them one of the birds found something interesting in the grass.

Immediately the other bird rushed over and tried to claim the prize for itself. This started an amazing dance duel!

And just as it started it was over! In fact the time stamps on the three photos above show that each shot was taken one (1) second after the other! So three grand seconds of display and it was all done. Life returned to normal and they continued to forage as they had before.

A little further on we spotted a Namaqua Dove sitting in a tree quite close to the road. These a very pretty little doves (at least in my opinion!) and I had been wanting a decent shot of them for sometime. This was not too bad, but still I'd like to get a better one.

Later on we spotted another secretary bird, some large herds of springbok, one almost get bored with the springbok becuase you see so many. Then a juvenile martial eagle sitting in a tree.

After that we decided to head back to camp and make brunch, we had been out for about two hours and had some nice sightings. I'll leave this post here and wind up our Urikaruus stay in my next post, then we moved on to Nossob .... but that's another days post :-)

all the best

Ivan

http://www.andersen.co.za/

The Urikaruus story continues

2010-05-24T02:34:00.000-07:00

Having had the excitement of the lions at lunchtime we moved back to our camp, on the way we passed a large herd of springbok right on the roadside. This opportunity allowed me to get a real close-up of some of these iconic animals.

Then when we arrived back at the camp there waiting for us at the drinking hole were a herd of giraffe. I watched with interest as these tall animals, that can look so graceful as they wander around the veld, akwardly reach down to get a drink. The shot of this one below had me holding my breath as its legs went wider and wider, occasionally slipped in the mud around the hole and seemed to have incredible flexibility as they bent under the weight and angle, forced by the massive distance the giraffe needs to come down to drink.

The Lanner falcons were also busy around the waterhole, swooping in try to catch a pigeon or two.

Also hanging around trying to look dis-interested were the fork-tailed drongos.

As the afternoon moved on we decided to go out for a short drive. The first new sighting we had was this Capped Wheatear

And then we spotted this little darlings of the desert! The bat-eared foxes. They were just a little too far away and moving further away, and the light was dropping so I struggled to get a decent shot of them, but this one illustrates their classic pose as they search of their evening meals.

We then headed back to camp. Shortly after we arrived back, the giraffe that had been at the waterhole earlier had been replaced by a large herd of wildebeest. I counted more than fifty in this image below, and that was not all of them.

We then settle down to review the photos we'd been taking and prepare for supper. Here is Claire Marie, my younger daughter looking through her pic's from the day.

And of course as it started to get darker, and the moths and other insects were attracted to our lights the geckos came out to feast with us!

I think thats all for this post ... its taken me way too long to get it finished!

all the best
Ivan
http://www.andersen.co.za/

In and around Urikaruus - part 5

2010-05-19T06:09:00.000-07:00

Well having given you some bugs (spiders!) and birds in my previous post, we'll move to the bigger beasts again for a while! As I had said we were told that there had been a kill just 8km from our camp. There were apparently four lions (Panthera leo) that had taken down a blue wildebeest (Connochaetes taurinus), and were busy eating it near the road. Now I must warn you, some of the images I will post here you may find a little upsetting or disturbing. It is not my intent to do either, but to simply illustrate what we saw and how nature operates in these wilderness areas. If this concerns you, please skip this post and come back tomorrow when I've posted the next installment!

So we headed off in the direction towards Mata Mata hoping that the lions would still be there and we'd be able to see them nice and close. We had seen lion a few days earlier, but they were so far away and lying still in the shade, so we could not get a decent view, never mind a picture, of them.

Well, just as described about 8km up the road we came across the lions and their prize!

This picture is of the younger female (in the foreground), and the two young males behind her. There were fours lions in total. Two older females and two young males. The three in the image above were lying right on the side of the road. The sandbank you can see in the foreground of the picture is the edge of the road!

The older of the two females was still nibbling at the carcass of the wildebeest. From this picture and the one following it you can see that the lions had eaten the rump and stomach areas of the wildebeest.

But what I found facinating were the butterflies that hovered around the kill area. Clearly in a world where moisture is at a premium these delicate creatures find something of value in the fluids distributed after a kill like this. Did you notice them in the images above? Take another look, click on the image to get a larger view.

After this lioness had eaten a little more she nochalantly picked up the carcass in her moth and dragged it into the shade of the nearby thorn tree. Now an adult wildebeest, which this clearly was, can weigh anything up to 274kg and the maximum weight a female lion is likely to reach is only 182kg. Ok, sure they had eaten a significant amount of meat off the carcass, but chances are that what remained was as heavy if not heavier than the lioness.

Here she is clearly enjoying another nibble after the exertion of moving the carcass.

What followed next was also, for me, an interesting interaction. Firstly, the lions, all four of them, seemed totally unperturbed and uninterested in the four or five vehicles that had gathered around their lunch table, despite the close proximity. Plus the camera lenses sticking in their faces and clicking sounds of photos been taken and the hum of voices from the various ocupants in the vehicles, all seemed to be of absolutely no interest to the lions at all. But I digress! The lioness that was at the carcass had gotten up and one of the young males had started to move towards her and the wildebeest.

As he moved past the lioness that had been lying in the shade beside the road with him, he lent down and rubbed his face against hers as she lay there, totally unmoved. He then moved towards the other lioness near the carcass, her reaction was completely different! She pulled back her ears and snarled at him!

He simply responded by turning around again and going to lie back down where he had been before!

Just as a matter of interest, for those of you that are a little technical, the shot above of the snarling lioness was taken with 160mm focal length and has not been cropped at ALL. In fact the only shots cropped in this post are the one of the butterflies and the portrait of the male cub. That's how close we were to the action!

all the best

Ivan

http://www.andersen.co.za/

In and around Urikaruus - part 4

2010-05-18T00:31:00.000-07:00

As I mentioned in my previous post this day started well and steadily improved! Firstly I had spotted the this spider

and her web in the early morning light, then as I moved around I saw this one in a bush nearby. Do you see the curious ant possibly heading into the danger zone?

This spider, I think is a member of the sociable web spider family, or community nest spider family. This one was starting a relatively new nest I think. I had seen these nests alnode the road and in the camp and had wondered if they were still inhabited as had been unable to see any spiders in them. On top of this most of the nests I saw appeared so encrusted with dust I wondered if anything could live in there!

Then I spotted these spiders peeking out of this nest. They appeared to have a number of eggsacs too. Here is a closer crop of the photo above.

Enough of spiders .... for now! The day moves on, and we are visited by some large herds of springbok, and some wildebeest. The image below captures part of the herd only!

We counted well over 200 animals in this herd. Then I spotted a crimson-breasted shrike an image of which I posted earlier, and still I was not able to get a really nice shot of this stunning bird.

But here it is again, just because I think the colours are so amazing, even though the shot is lousy! One of the friendly familiar chats popped in too,

as did the glossy starling and of course the sparrow-weaver and family.

Then a fork-tailed drongo came by.

A group of Namaqua Sandgrouse (Pterocles namaqua) were also making regular visits to the waterhole.

Flying high and calling with their characteristic whistle. We also saw a juvenile marshall eagle and a black-breasted snake eagle. Neither of which came close enough to allow me a decent shot, but I did get pictures of both at other occasions.

Of course the ground squirrels were also doing their usual foraging around, with their portable shade umbrellas working overtime in the harsh light of the mid-morning sun

And then ...... the camp attendant came to tell us that some of the other guests had just returned from a drive and had seen some lion with a kill not far from our camp. So we got a few things together and jumped into the car. But I'll save that story for my next post!

all the best

Ivan

http://www.andersen.co.za/

In and around Urikaruus - part 3

2010-05-17T12:03:00.000-07:00

Well day two (April 2nd 2010) dawned in Urikaruus, this was after an interesting evening sitting on the veranda cooking our evening meal on an open fire. As night was starting to set in my daughter Claire Marie spotted (no pun intended :-) ) a leopard strolling down out of the bush, almost directly opposite from us, towards the watering hole. She, that is the leopard, was quite nonchalant and disinterested in the hum of exitement stemming from these wide-eyed invaders of what was clearly her home territory. Unfortunately it was too dark, and she was too far away to get any kind of photo of her, so we just sat and watched in the gathering gloom, for as long as we could see her and then returned to our evening meal, as she set off to find hers.

Well, having spent so much time in the car over the first few days of our trip we decided to relax on this morning and see what may make an appearance in and around our camp. I tried to get a few landscape shots from our bedroom veranda just after the sun rose, but I won't bore you with those attempts having already posted some views in my earlier post. Having looked out front and not seen much other than the great view, I then turned my attention to behind the chalet and saw this in the rays of the rising sun!

It must have been there the day before, but it needed the early morning light to reveal it to my human eyes. What an amazing web! The top anchor line stretched probably nearly two metres, you can see it running almost horizontally accross the top of the image. The overall web was about 40-50cm high and about double that in horizontal diameter. One of the amazing things about this web was that it was virtually invisible once the sun got up into the sky. If you look really closely you can see the spider in the top left part of the middle circle of the web. It just give you a perspective on the size of construction this little lady made!

Still struggling to see her? Well, here's an even closer view.

What amazing colours and shapes she has. She blends in with the natural surrounds incredibly well too.

I'll leave this post here, but this day started well and got better and better. So stay around and I'll tell you more :-)

all the best,
Ivan
http://www.andersen.co.za/

In and around Urikaruus ... part 2

2010-05-06T08:27:00.000-07:00

Relaxing on the veranda of our unit looking over the waterhole in front, wondering what might come along next, I was surprised by this tiny little fuit fly (Rhacochlaena pulchella Bezzi 1920 (Tephritidae: Adramini)) and some of its friends!

I'm not sure if it was after the sweat / salt or dry skin on my leg .... yes, that's my leg it is sitting on! But it did not seem to bite or sting, and when I zoomed in I was amazed at its colours and detail. This prompted me to start looking around for some other smaller occupants of the camp.

The next resident I discovered was this kite spider, she had built her web on the side of the kitchen unit, between it and our bedroom unit.

And what an amazing web. I tried to get a shot that would illustrate the density and complexity of this web. Theses are the best I could do.

The spider you see on the image on the top of the three above, is the black blob on the end of the sausage looking object, more or less in the middle of the image on the left (vertically) and on the left side (horizontally). The image to the right of the two lower images is a landscape crop of the left side image. If you look closely and use your imagination you can see the spider. But what I'm really trying to illustrate here is the density and complexity of her web. Other than webs of sociable spiders, which I'll post later this web has to be the most complex I've seen developed by a single spider.

Another regular visitor at this unit was the Kalahari Tree Skink. There were various members of this family around. This old chap looked rather as if he/she had survived a few wars! But none-the-less was relatively relaxed around us, and would check in every now and again to see if something interesting had been dropped for it to eat.

Then just to round off this post and the day, I spotted this little web glistening in the setting sun. I never discovered the occupant as it was quite high in a tree, and out of reach from the chalet veranda. I liked the way the sunlight picked up the strands, and I think it was possibly another kite spider.

And then to finish this post, one of the other regulars where ever we went. The yellow mongoose, put in and appearance, always alert always interested.

all the best,

Ivan

http://www.andersen.co.za/

In and around Urikaruus

2010-05-04T03:55:00.000-07:00

Whew, its been a mission getting back on-line after all the disruptions to our local internet services. Hopefully that's behind us now.

Urikaruus, a cute little camp as I said previously. We were treated to some very warm (not surprisingly) weather during our stay here. This was the first camp that we were to spend more than a single night at. It was great to settle in and feel that there was no pressure to move on again.

As I described in my previous post, the units faced out into what I suppose may have been an old river bed, long since dried-up, now with a man made watering hole put in place to provide the resident animals with some place to get a drink! And come and drink they did!

The main visitors were the blue wildebeest (Connochaetes taurinus) and springbok (Antidorcas marsupialis), and they came in numbers! Some of the herds were well over 100 animals strong. We also had giraffe (Giraffa camelopardalis), a number of different bird species, the Lanner Falcons (Falco biarmicus) were there daily catching either Namaqua doves (Oena capensis), Cape turtle doves (Streptopelia capicola) or Sandgrouse (Pterocles namaqua). Here are two lanner falcons that had just caught another bird and were eating it on a dead tree just to the right of our chalet.

The White-browed sparrow-weaver (Plocepasser mahali) and Cape Glossy starling (Lamprotornis nitens) were regular visitors on our veranda.

The sparrow-weaver and his wife and child and obviously become VERY habituated to the humans residing here, and vocally demanded to be fed on a regualr basis. They were so tame that I could touch them from time to time. We are strong believers in the fact that you MUST not feed the animals in the National Parks, so we would try to discourage these persistent little birds, but clearly others had been feeding them. Sad!

This little juvenile Laughing Dove Stigmatopelia senegalensis) had my daughters very concerned that it was too young to look after itself, but it seemed to be quite capable, and also very un-afraid of the human poking camera lenses in its face!

all the best
Ivan
http://www.andersen.co.za/

Back on-line at last ... and on with the trip.

2010-04-29T03:23:00.000-07:00

Well, over the last few days there have been apparent "upgrades" taking place to the Seacom undersea cable that supplies South Africa with a significant portion of our international bandwidth. As a result of this work it has been almost inmpossible (for me anyway) to work on any of the international sites I use, like blogger.

Well, it seems like we're functioning again. So back to the trip.

Just after mid-day we arrived at Urikaruus. A small little camp just off the main road about halfway between Twee Rivieren and Mat Mata camps. A sum total of four two bed chalets, plus the Camp Attendants unit.

The picture on the right is of the chalet we stayed in. You can just see the roof of my car at the bottom of the pic. Gives you an idea of how high these units are on their stilts! The room to the left of our chalet is the kitchen / diningroom beloning to our unit. The image on the left of the two above looks along the back of the units from the perspective of just outside our unit at ground level.

And this the view from the front of the dining room!

Amazing :-) ... One of the things that really amazed all of us was the clarity of and colours in the clouds and sky, I don't think a picture can truely do it justice, but I've tried!

all the best Ivan
http://www.andersen.co.za/

On the move again ... Urikaruus here we come!

2010-04-23T02:07:00.000-07:00

Urikaruus is described by the offical Sanparks website as :

- Unfenced, built on stilts, tourism assist. on duty
- No children under 12 allowed
- 1 bedroom with 2 single beds - No additional persons allowed
- Equipped kitchen - Gas fridge / freezer
- Provide own drinking water and firewood
- Barbeque facilities on deck
- Solar power for lights, gas for hot water
- Wc and shower
Urikaruus Wilderness Camp - Guests have to provide their own drinking water and firewood.

This really does not do this lovely little camp justice. Once again I'm moving ahead of myself.
We left Mata Mata around 9am in the morning. There had been an impressive rain storm the previous night, so we were interested to see what had happened on the roads and in the veld as a result.

As we moved out into the park it almost seemed; at first; as if the rain had just been sucked into the ground. The nice thing was that the dust had settled and when you drove along there was no real dust being created. we were sure as the day went on and it got hotter again this would soon change!

Our first sighting on this morning was one of our regulars, the black-backed jackal. This one was right by the roadside and I managed to get a couple of decent pictures, this one being my favourite:

Next was another regular, the Pale Chanting Goshawk (Melierax canorus), I was still searching for a great shot of this bird, and this nwas a little better but still not where I really wanted it.

Then I spotted the comedian of the Kgalagadi! This gemsbok had clearly caught its horns in something and had not managed to rid itself of the foliage.

And then junior! This little springbok was just exercising its running legs as we arrived. I unfortunately was not in a position to catch its first pronk, and dart. I think it could not have been more than 24hrs or so old. At a close look one can see some of the afterbirth remains on its mothers rear.

The light by now 10am, had become extremely harsh and bright, as you can see in the background of this images, making the lighting quite challenging. So, I am relatively pleased with the outcome of these shots, although I had to do quite a bit of post-processing.
Then we spotted a Lesser Grey Shrike (Lanius minor), a Lanner Falcon (Falco biarmicus), a Tawny Eagle (Aquila rapax) all in quick sucession.

Closely followed by a striped kingfisher (Halcyon chelicuti) with a grasshopper it had just caught, another Tawny Eagle and two Southern White-faced Owls (Ptilopsis granti).

Then we saw the impact of the previous night rain. The road flooded and the communal nest of some Sociable Weavers (Philetairus socius) that had gotten just too heavy with the water and fallen out of the tree.

The some more Eagles! Wow, we had gotten so used to NOT seeing big raptors in some of the other wilderness areas we visit on a more regular basis, that we were starting to feel quite spoiled! A Juvenile Martial Eagle (Polemaetus bellicosus) and a Black-breasted Snake Eagle (Circaetus pectoralis).

Whew, quite a morning, and I never mentioned the usual ... herds of springbok, wildebeest, gemsbok and of course ground squirrels and some smaller birds we could not identify. All of this was in two and a half hours! Shortly after that we arrived at our next camp Urikaruus. But thats for my next post ;-)

all the best
Ivan
http://www.andersen.co.za/

In and around Mata Mata

2010-04-22T04:27:00.000-07:00

Having arrived reasonably early in Mata Mata, we took the opportunity to relax, have a swim and stretch our legs a bit. Having now spent the best part of 24hrs in the car over the last three days! We unfortunately had only managed to book a single night here too, so we would be back on the road in the morning, but fortuately not so far this time, about 60km back on the road we travelled to a camp called Urikaruus.

Anyway, once again I'm getting ahead of myself!
Mata Mata ...

A pleasant camp, still quite large with a number of chalets and a camping area. This camp is fenced off from the park, has a small swimming pool, petrol station, small shop and reception.

Yep, thats me and Claire Marie (in front of me) and Gayle (on the edge of the photo). As you can see the pool was not sparkling blue and clean, but it WAS wet, and cool. A big relief after the hot days we'd spent in the car and on the road.

After our swim we were relaxing on the veranda of our chalet, when I spotted a Crimson-breasted Gonolek (formerly Crimson-breasted Shrike) Laniarius atrococcineus, it is an African bird occurring in a broad swathe from southern Angola to the Free State in South Africa. This shrike is extremely nimble and restless, its penetrating whistles being heard far more often than the bird is seen, its bright colour notwithstanding. The sexes have the same colouration and are indistinguishable from each other. A yellow-breasted form is occasionally seen, and was at first thought to be a separate species. (credit wikipedia).

As it says in wikipedia, this bird does not pose for you, it is always on the move. It is however, beautiful! I'm on a mission to try and get a really good picture of it still. Here is my best one from this trip.

Then of course we were visited by the local residents .... the Cape Ground Squirrel (Xerus inauris) is found in most of the drier parts of southern Africa from South Africa, through to Botswana, and into Namibia.
The name Cape Ground Squirrel is somewhat misleading as it actually has a much wider area of habitation. This common name may have been arrived at to distinguish it from a tree squirrel (the Eastern Grey Squirrel) found around Cape Town, which was imported from Europe by Cecil John Rhodes. (credit wikipedia)

Then there are the other little regulars, these cute little birds are so aptly named, Familiar Chats! You'll see them all over the country, and they'll aways be around hopping all over flicking their wings.

The Familiar Chat, Cercomela familiaris, is a small passerine bird of the Old World flycatcher family Muscicapidae. It is a common resident breeder in Africa south of the Sahara in rocky and mountainous habitat and around human habitation. (credit wikipedia)

As it started to get dark we settled down the the serious buiness of cooking supper!

That's all for now.

all the best
Ivan
http://www.andersen.co.za/

The road to Mata Mata

2010-04-21T03:56:00.000-07:00

As we drove out of the Twee Rivieren camp on Wednesday just after 8am in the morning, Ria and I had switched roles. She was now driving and I was sitting in the passenger seat with my camera. Every hopeful of some exciting sitings. We were a little wary of the amount of time that it potentiall could take us to get to Mata Mata, even though it was "only" 120km away. As I described in my earlier posts we had already spent almost two full days travelling in the car just to get here, and all of us were somewhat travel weary.

The first aminals we saw on our drive that morning was to be one of the icons of the Kalahari, the Gemsbok.

I think if you have not seen one of these, and taken a photo of it, you have not been to the Kgalagadi! They are beautiful and amazing creatures.

The gemsbok or gemsbuck (Oryx gazella) is a large African antelope, of the Oryx genus.
Gemsbok are mainly desert-dwelling and do not depend on drinking to supply their physiological water needs, but many of the northern Gemsbok live in open grasslands where water is readily available. (credit wikipeadia)

Gemsbok are able to increase their body temperature to 45 degrees from 35.7 degrees C in order to delay evaporative cooling. (credit http://animaldiversity.ummz.umich.edu/site/accounts/information/Oryx_gazella.html)

They do become, however a very common sight as we experienced on this trip.

The next thing we saw was a Kori Bustard:

The Kori Bustard (Ardeotis kori) is a large bird native to Africa. It is a member of the bustard family. It may be the heaviest bird capable of flight, although this title may also belong to the similarly-dimensioned Great Bustard. The male Kori Bustard averages about 110 cm (3.6 ft) in length, stands 60–90 cm (2.0–3.0 ft) tall and have a wingspan about 230-275 cm. An average male bird would weigh about 12.4 kg (27 lb), but exceptional birds may weigh over 20 kg (44 lb). The female Kori Bustard averages 5.7 kg (13 lb) and is usually 20% shorter than a male. (credit wikipedia)

Then we spotted a black-backed jackal strolling through the veld, with a couple of curious ground squirrels (Xerus inauris) looking on.

Both these animals were to become regular sightings for us too. Then we spotted these Namaqua Sandgrouse (Pterocles namaqua) is a species of bird in the Pteroclididae family. The male has the plain coloured neck. They tend to flock in numbers to the water holes.

The next animals we saw are also in abundance, and are also, in my opinion icons of the Kalahari. The BlueWildebeest (Connochaetes taurinus) and Springbok (Antidorcas marsupialis). Often seen together, these animals are seen in herds of many hundred animals at a time, however you also see lone males of both quite often.

And then we spotted some real excitement. Three cheetah (Acinonyx jubatus) with a springbok they had recently captured. They were lying under a tree with their meal, some 75m or so away from the road.

We sat and watched these cheetahs, who we extremely relaxed and not at all interested in the four or five vehicle loads of humans, pointing various optical devices at them!

We then moved on and spotted these swallow-tailed bee-eaters (Merops hirundineus).

Next on the agenda were giraffe, and lots more springbok, and some wildebeest. The daytime temperatures we starting to hot up some many of the animals we seeking shade. This large herd of springbok, with the giraffe and wildebeest mingling was well over 130 animal strong!

I count 132 just in this bottom image alone, and there were many other spread along the base of this little koppie, as can been seen in the image above.

And finally, at least for this post another two birds I came to identify as regulars in this region. The Pale Chanting Goshawk, and the Secretary bird. Not my best images of either, but I'll save those for a later post.

The Secretary bird, I have subsequently discovered is quite unique:
The Secretarybird or Secretary Bird (Sagittarius serpentarius) is a large, mostly terrestrial bird of prey. Endemic to Africa, it is usually found in the open grasslands and savannah of the sub-Sahara. Although a member of the order Accipitriformes, which also includes many other diurnal raptors such as kites, buzzards, vultures, and harriers, it is given its own family, Sagittariidae. (credit wikipedia)

We pulled into the Mata Mata reception at about 2:30pm that afternoon. A good day all-in-all.

All the best
Ivan
http://www.andersen.co.za/

In the park ... at last

2010-04-20T06:26:00.000-07:00

Well, finally we arrived at the gates into the Kgalagadi Transfrontier park. The check-in went smoothly, although one could clearly see we were no longer in a fast-paced city, but out on the fringes of the desert (and the edge of civilization!). Nothing was done in any kind of hurry, or with any form of urgency..... but it was done, and in a reasonably friendly manner.

Then off to our chalet just accross the way. Interestingly this reception area is also a border post between South Africa and Botswana, and due to the renovations and developments taking place you actually cross over into the Botswana section to go around to the rest camp, which is back on the South African side.
This is a view of the chalets on the Botswana side from the South African camp.

Taken as the sun was setting, so you can see the sun reflecting off the chalets, with the dark clouds in the background. Interestingly, one of the things Ria had said, was that she would love to be in the Kalahari when it rains! Well, she got her wish, it actually rained three time whilst we were there!

One of the first animals we saw once we were in the park was this:

The yellow mongoose. I was quite excited but came to realise as the trip went on, that these little animals have become quite habituated to humans in the camps and are frequently seen scavenging around for tidbits.

The Yellow Mongoose (Cynictis penicillata), sometimes referred to as the Red Meerkat, is a small mammal averaging about 1 lb (1/2 kg) in weight and about 20 in (500 mm) in length. A member of the mongoose family, it lives in open country, from semi-desert scrubland to grasslands in Angola, Botswana, South Africa, Namibia, and Zimbabwe.
As many as twelve subspecies of yellow mongoose have been described. In general, the yellow mongoose has lighter highlights on the underbelly and chin, a bushy tail, and a complete lack of sexual dimorphism. Southern yellow mongooses are larger, have yellow or reddish fur, longer fur, and a longer tail with a characteristic white tip. Northern subspecies tend towards smaller size, grey colouration, a grey or darker grey tip to the tail, and shorter hair more appropriate to the hotter climate.
The yellow mongoose is carnivorous, consuming mostly arthropods but also other small mammals, lizards, snakes and eggs of all kinds. (credit wikipedia)

Another of the regulars one sees in the evenings and early mornings are the geckos, they tend to go to the lights so they can catch the numerous insects that flock to them at night:

This is Bibron's gecko (Pachydactylus bibronii) and is a moderate-sized gecko that when fully grown reaches between 6 and 8 inches. It has a stockier build than most other geckos. The female is generally smaller than the male. Its base color is brown, and it has a beaded pattern dorsally, with horizontal black strips and white dots. The belly is white or very light brown. Newly-hatched Bibron's geckos' line and color patterns look solid while the adults' appear to be more broken. The female sometimes lacks the white dots.
Bibron's gecko is arboreal and ground-dwelling. It is territorial, and males are very aggressive toward each other. Individuals can commonly be found missing appendages in the wild. The female usually lays two clutches per year, with two eggs per clutch. These geckos are very fast runners. Also, they are good at hiding in leaves or on rocks.

This species is distributed across the southern part of the African continent. It is common in South Africa, where it is one of the largest gecko species. (credit wikipedia).

After a nice meal, we settled down for our first night in the park. Only to be woken up a little later with bats flying around inside our chalet!, Well there didn't seem to be much that we could do about it so we went back to bed. We woke up the floowing morning to find that Ria's bed had been the target of the bats latrine activity over night .....eeeoww! Anyway we were up and washed, and headed off to the next camp: Mata Mata some +-120km away, over dirts roads with a speed limit of 50km per hour, and hopefully some interesting game viewing along the way. But that's for another post.

all the best
Ivan
http://www.andersen.co.za/

The long and winding road (NOT!)

2010-04-19T02:45:00.000-07:00

Well, having jumped around a bit in the last two posts, I'll get back on track with this one. We left Mokala Game Reserve at 6am the following morning (Tues 30th March), and headed out back through Kimberly onto the road to Groblershoop, then Upington and onto Twee Rivieren.

According to google maps, 733 km 12 hours 53 mins. First planned stop was to be in Upington (481 km 7 hours 26 mins). We were hoping it wasn't going to take us that long.

Hmmm... well it looked like it was going to be a long day. Thankfully we'd decided to break the trip by staying over at Mokala.

Well, we got into Kimberly just around 7:30am, and decided to stop at a shopping centre and get some breakfast, this took us to 8 o'clock, when we left Kimberly on the road to Groblershoop. Two things struck me as we headed out.

Can you see anything in particular in the image above? Taken through the front windscreen of my car. This is about and hour or so outside of Groblershoop, admittedly taken on the return trip, but hey, going either way it's still as straight!

Well, for me, the first was just how straight the road was, and the second just how empty! Not another car in sight. I'll have to install auto-pilot in my car for the next trip :-).

We arrived in Upington at about 11:45 (Approx 399km from Kimberly). OK, so google maps got that one wrong ... and estimated 5hrs and 38min, we did in 3hrs and 45min, without breaking any speed limits!

Stopped off at a filling station, and fortunately decided to check my oil and water reservoir. As I was checking I noticed that it looked as if the main hose feeding water from the radiator into the cooling system had started to leak. Asked the attendant if and where the nearest Nissan dealer was, fortunately just around the corner ... whew! Drove around there and asked if they could help us. We had to be at Twee Rivieren reception before 6:30pm to check in ... still another 260km to go. Plus time to repair!

Anyway they Nissan people were extremely helpful and obliging! We left the vehicle with them and wandered off to try and find somewhere to have lunch. An hour and a bit later I returned to the Nissan dealership, and they had fixed my car! Didn't have the exact spare, but they made a plan and sorted it out. Well done guys and thanks, for a mere R363.00 we were back on the road. A certain disaster averted had I not noticed the developing problem, and they had not been so accommodating.

So by 2pm we were back on the road. Eeiisshhh another long straight road:

I was interested to note that there are a number of road signs warning people to be careful because bat-eared foxes (Otocyon megalotis) tend to cross the road.

Cute little creatures, aren't they? Well on that stretch of +-240km I counted 6 road kills of these lovely little animals, that was just on the way there, and on the return trip again another 7 or 8 fresh kills. Shocking.
Why is this happening? Are the people travelling these roads not meant to be nature lovers ... the road basically only goes to one place, the game reserve. Well, I try to stick to the advertised speed limit, and generally do fairly well at this, the cars we did see on this road were generally going much faster than us. I would imagine that the bulk of these kills happen either at night or early morning/evening. I presume because the traffic volume are so low on these roads and the roads a so straight the people take advantage of these factors and drive way over the speed limit.

Fortunately this was the only sad aspect on this trip. This post has also got too long, so I'll end off here for now.

All the best
Ivan
http://www.andersen.co.za/

I'm getting ahead of myself.

2010-04-18T05:49:00.000-07:00

Hmmm..... I've rushed headlong into the trip without telling you about some of the things that went on/in before!

In planning this trip we established that we would need to take drinking water for at least 9 days, all our food and other drinks for that period too, as well as the obvious .... clothing, cameras, books (we like to take at least a bird book, mammal book, reptile book, spider book, tree/bushes, and then reading material too.) and that's for 4 of us. Ria (my wife), Gayle and Claire Marie our daughters, and of course myself. My computer goes too, for downloading images taken on the trip.

Foolishly, I did not take any shots of all of the items packed into the back of my Nissan Sani, it was quite a load! Here's some of the detail just to give you an idea:
1. 65 litres of drinking water, in 2 25l jerry cans, plus 3 5l bottles.
2. 18 litres of fruit juice.
3. 12 beers and 12 ciders (all we could fit :-( )
4. 4 camping chairs and 1 camping table.
5. 1 tyre compressor (you have to deflate your tyres when in the park)
6. 2 camera bags and monopod, 1 laptop and briefcase
7. 2 large suitcases, 1 for Ria and me, and the other for the girls (20yrs old and 17yrs old)
8. 2 vanity cases, one medical box
9. 2 5kg bags of charcoal
10. 1 40l cooler box with all our meat for 10 days.
11. 3 55l crates containing all our other food, the juice and drinks mentioned above
12. 1 large torch, 2 headlamps, 1 camping shovel, some basic braai equipment.
13. 3 pillows ....

To mention the bulk of it I think!! Here is an older image of an earlier trip for which we took considerably less:

Impressive? ... well I think so.

all the best, Ivan
http://www.andersen.co.za/

The Kgalagadi Epic Adventure

2010-04-17T08:45:00.000-07:00

As a family we embarked on what we thought would be a nice holiday, at the end of March 2010. Living in the suburbs of greater Johannesburg, South Africa, we planned this trip to the Kgalagadi Transfrontier national Park. A South African Game reserve in the North West of our country. See the google map below:
Point A is where we stay and point B the entry into the South African portion of this park.

According to google maps, the route we took, the total distance just to get to the park entrance from home was 1 141 km – about 15 hours 23 mins .... hhhmmm well !

As you can see from the map we did not take the most direct route, because we had been advised that that road was not in great condition. So we made the decision to break the trip into two "easy" days, and stay over at Mokala National Park. A relatively new (open 2007) National Park, just south of Kimberly.

A first days trip of approximately 579km, and according to google route maps should take us about 7hr52m. We could not really understand that as 579km, all things being equal should normally take us less than 6hrs. We hadn't reckoned on the roadworks! It wound up taking us closer to 7hr35m... what does Google NOT know??!

We had left home at 10:30am on the morning of Monday 29th March, and arrived at Mokala reception at 6:05pm. But what a welcome! On the short trip from the gate into reception (about 6km if I recall correctly), we saw buffalo (Syncerus caffer), black-bellied korhaan (Eupodotis afra) and kudu (Tragelaphus strepsiceros).

And then ...... the sunset! WOW.

more later.

All the best

Ivan
http://www.andersen.co.za

It's been a long time .....

2010-04-16T08:49:00.000-07:00

I haven't managed to get around to posting here for some time, as I've been busy / distracted / lazy .... or whatever else you may care to call the excuse ;-). I've decided to change the initial direction a little, and focus more on my experiences of taking photos and how my journey is developing (pun intended).

So, if you don't like it talk to her ....... ^ ................. this beautiful lady allowed us within metres of her and her small pride on a recent trip into the Kgalagadi transfrontier park. I'll detail some of our experiences in later post. In the meantime I've created a new website which I am populating with my images, and would apprecaite any feedback comments/ input you may have.
http://www.andersen.co.za/

all the best
Ivan