A beautiful leopard encounter

It was the end of a beautiful day. The sky clouds were gathering into what looked like rain and the golden grasses waved moodily in the wind like a whisper of brushed silver against the last light.

We had been out on a long excursion around Deception Pan which had seen us following a route along a scarcely used hardly there track through the sand bumping along and breaking apart the thorny bushes on either side to scrape past ( This resulted in our water tank tap opening with the loss of much of our precious needed water supply forcing us to leave the park sooner than planned ).

We were on our way to our campsite when in front of us appearing in a silhouette on the road was a leopard. She sat there as still as a statue in the golden evening light absolutely perfect in grace and harmony with her surrounds.

Seemingly undisturbed by our proximity she casually walked to the side of us and continued on her evening wake up stroll cat stretching up a thorn tree, sitting next to Joydah our 2nd vehicle for a while and then crossing over to the vast pan on the other side of the road where Gemsbok and Springbok grazed peacefully in the distance.

We followed her path as she traced the outskirts of the pan along the bush line choosing the most magnificent giant tree to climb and there she sat overlooking her kingdom in the magical last light of the day with a rainbow in the sky overhead.Read more