Last day in the Kalahari

The alarm went off at 4:45am and it woke us with a jump. We hadn’t slept well. When we went to bed it was windy so we closed all but my window and then the wind dropped off and it got stuffy.
Surprisingly I was the first one up and out of the trailer and initially I thought I had the times wrong. Then I saw our mate in the land rover discovery was up and I knew I was right.
We were in no hurry to get to the gate and left camp just after 5:30am and rolled through the gates at 5:37am taking a very slow drive of 20kph.
We took 3 hours to drive to Kij Kij water hole using the Nossob road, where our young cape faces were just going in for the day but apart from that we only saw young goshawks eating something and the usual odd herd animal.
We decided to just turn around and head back to camp there wasn’t a lot that was going to beat yesterdays sightings.
Just after the 10km to go marker we came across a lady that told us there was a leopard in a tree just before the Mata Mata junction by the time we got there, there were already 5 cars and a game vehicle. We could just about see the leopard although it was surrounded by branches and foliage unless you could see straight up which nobody could so everybody stopped and queued waiting for it to jump down which wouldn’t be anytime soon. We waited about 30 minutes and then gave up. We were to far back and now there was atleast 20 cars and nobody had a clear view. It just wasn’t meant to be today.
We returned to camp, had breakfast of ghostie toasties and while I washed up Ellie went and got a token for the washing machine and put our dirty clothes in. Then we compiled a short shopping list for tomorrow of the essentials before heading into the caravan for a nap before it got too hot.
I got back up at 12:15pm and it was roasting, 37.2°c and rising. The heat was just bouncing off the sand and even the breeze felt like a hairdryer.
We went to the swimming pool for an hour at 2:30pm and then at 4pm we decided to take our chances at seeing the leopard in the tree and hoped that she would come down, so we went on our final drive and 3km in there was the leopard and traffic was still building. We waited for 30 minutes and then decided to call it and turned around as the sky was getting very black and we returned to camp.
Back at camp I cooked Wors with mash and relish while the sky got darker and lightning started flashing in the distance over Namibia.
At 7pm we headed up to the hide again and the heat was just building. It just felt so humid. I said I wish it would rain to cool things down and 2 hours later as we were laying in bed my wish was granted.
At first there were some really big gusts of wind and the thunder just cracked overhead and I suggested we put the awning away. By the time we had got our shoes on the first drops had started. I didn’t even bother taking the pegs out, I just loosened the guy lined and unhooked them and within 2 minutes we had the awning in it’s bag and zipped up as it started throwing it down.
The trailer rocked and the sound was deafening as the thunder cracked and the roof was pelted with hailstones. Within minutes there was a river flowing through the middle of the campsite, it was an incredible display of nature.
The rain lasted until 10:30pm by which time we were grateful to be able to get in bed thankful that not a lot of water got in this time.En savoir plus