Today began with breakfast and then a lecture at 0700 on weather and climate. It was quite interesting and a lot of the theory I already knew the basics of. It won’t really be used too much in guiding, but it’s just useful to know. We also got our survival and navigation tests back from last week – 100%!
After the lecture I went for a nice walk with Jess, Katie, Tanza and Rachel and then we all received books that we had ordered from Sharin and our FGASA log books and membership numbers. We also sorted out our Game Drive groups for the semester. I then filled in my workbook and began studying. For brunch today I had a fried egg sandwich, salad and pineapple. I went back to the classroom and did a bit more studying and sorting out my photos as well.
At 1600 it was time for a Game Drive. We arrived at Makalali and Cal began his game drive brief. Vaughan told him to drag it out a bit and within about two minutes the heavens opened. We left the vehicle and sheltered in one of the little huts. We saw a bolt of lightning on the electric fence which made a really cool noise. The group that had already started their game drive came back and the other group arrived to Makalali completely drenched!
We watched the storm for about half an hour, entertained by a ‘bad weather news broadcast’ and some mud wrestling and then when it eased off enough we began our Game Drive. For some reason the rain made us all quite hyper and everything was hilarious – it was one of my favourite Game Drives yet. We saw zebra and wildebeest and then stumbled upon a pride of four lionesses, just relaxing and enjoying the cooler weather. We sat and watched them for almost two hours! They were so cute to watch, rolling over, stretching, yawning, cuddling each other – ridiculously cute! It was such an awesome sighting! We drove a bit away and had our drinks stop and then headed back to see the lions. By now the sun had set and it was almost dark, we could see a herd of wildebeest near where the lions were, they were very alert and making lots of alarm calls – they could smell the lions. They got closer and closer to where the lions were and then just turned around and left. We went to look for the lions again but couldn’t see them. Another group picked them up a bit later, right at the waterhole where we had our drinks stop!
We drove back to camp and had a very brief sighting of a bushbaby and possibly a civet. Dinner tonight was beef stew, rice and salad, after which it was time for showers and bed.