Lions in Chobe National Park, Chobe Safari Lodge Game Drive 6 am

Puku on alert, where are those lions?




Ahh, here they come, how awesome!






And, wouldn't you know it, here come the dang game drive vehicles. The guides radio each other when they find something big like lions.


Early morning game drive with Chobe Safari Lodge


We had been invited to go on boat ride on the Chobe river Sunday afternoon. We needed to pay our
park entry fee and Finn had suggested it might be cheaper to go through the Lodge than pay 130 pula
each for the entry as individuals. We decided to do the early morning game drive with Chobe Safari
Lodge. Finn was correct---we paid only 70 pula for the entrance fee through the Lodge. Of course, we
had to pay for the game drive also.

Got up early and fixed our coffee, heated a roll and went up to reception to go on the drive. It was very
cold that morning and I had on t-shirt, shirt, sweater, long sleeve shirt, and windbreaker! I also was
wearing my winter hat. Fortunately, I had a blanket to cover my legs. It was especially cold as we drove
to the park.

There were only six of us in our vehicle which was nice. In the beginning we were not seeing much in the
way of game but were enjoying the rising of the sun over the river. You can see how much the water is still
up and the lushness of the place.

The guides do communicate with each other by radio and alert each other when they have something in
sight. Our guide had told us we might not see any "cats" because they are usually seen later in the day,
when suddenly we could see off in the distance what looked like animals jumping across the plains. It
was lions! They did not catch what they were after and stopped and come right at our safari vehicle. they
were very, very close!

We got to enjoy watching them along with several other vehicles that had come driving up. The two we were
watching were females and our driver said the males are staying with the young cubs. We then continued
on our drive. We saw a huge male kudu with four females. He was so kind as to pose for us until we had
all gotten our shots.






Finally we experienced the Kori Bustard, the largest flying bird in Africa actually flying, scared up by a lion!

We saw two different kinds of vultures, but did not see any evidence there had been a kill in the area. We also
saw our first jackals for this trip. As we were driving back from the park, there were three elephants in the
bushes by the road. All in all, a very nice game drive.