“If I have ever seen magic, it has been in Africa.” – John Hemingway (American author)
Our Safari on Phinda Game Reserve was incredible, these are just some of the animals we saw during our 3 days there:
Lions
We saw two prides of lions, the first was two females in a tree. Their mother had kicked them out of the pride when she had another litter and they don’t have cubs of their own yet. The second was the main pride of three lionesses and 5 cubs (2 female, 3 male). The lionesses of the pride are a pair of sisters and then a third lioness who the rangers call “a tank” because she’s almost as large as a male. The pride has been without a male for a few months after he died of a bacterial infection, but no male has successfully taken it over because according to the rangers, these are the meanest lionesses in South Africa. Several males have tried, all have been sent packing.
Cheetah
The first and maybe most fascinating thing we saw was two male cheetah brothers trying to mate with a young female in her first heat. She wasn’t having any of it, so we watched her beat them up for about an hour right next to our car. The rangers told us this was very rare behavior to see as cheetahs hardly ever vocalize except to their cubs and are secretive about their mating tactics (video to be added when we have faster wifi).
Fun Fact 1: In a particularly brutal moment, the female ran one of the brothers into the side of our jeep. It was the first time the ranger had ever seen an animal touch a jeep.
Fun Fact 2: One of the male cheetahs looked at Phil and hissed at him… just like a cat… if the cat could kill you. Phil and the rest of our group were told to move over slowly to give the cats space until we could move away from them.
Elephant
We found a mega herd! 3 separate herds combined to walk to the grasses on the other side of the reserve after a rainfall, so we watched several matriarchs usher younger females and babies through the trees and tall grass, all while keeping the bulls who followed in check (some tried to get handsy with the ladies, but the matriarch in the back of the herd kept pushing them off). The ranger told us elephant herds will often combine when walking to the same place; the herd with the oldest matriarch will lead at the front, and the younger matriarchs space throughout to keep everyone together.
Rhino
We saw several white rhino. Rhino are apparently very skittish, we couldn’t get too close because they’re very wary of the vehicles. We surprised this young male rhino while searching for elephants (hence why the picture is so close). His horn has been cut to deter poachers. It’s a painless procedure and the horn does grow back, so they will continue to cut it. Phinda also has rare black rhino, we didn’t see any during our stay though. They’ve been so successful at breeding on the reserve that Phinda now ships some to other reserves with very strict anti-poaching procedures to help repopulate them.
Giraffe
While stopped for coffee and a quick stretch of the legs, we were surprised by a herd of giraffe walking by with their babies. The mothers just looked at us and continued on their way, but the babies weren’t so sure, hence the running to catch up to mom.
Nyala and Impala
We’d often spot nyala and impala females and fawns hanging out in our camp. We saw a few males in bachelor groups while on our drives.
Hippos
We passed these hippos hanging out in a pond on our way to watch the lions.
We were sad to leave our trackers and guides at the end of 3 days, but more adventure awaits in Cape Town!
Taking Two 