21st April

Time for one more update before lunch. We had to wait Thursday and Friday because there was hunting going on at the game farm so I was happy to go over the weekend. Between here and Ghanzi at about 6.30am I spotted and identified a caracal trotting across the road in the half dark, bigger than a domestic cat, tawny coloured with big tufted ears. Every day Phale asks me what I want to see and I always say Zebras (must be the subliminal Investec logo) and blow me before 8.30am we'd seen Kudu, Impala, Gemsbok, Steenbok and three Zebra. It was the roughest rockiest day yet and at one time a late call pitched both guys off the bonnet. We only saw one cheetah spoor but masses of brown hyena and both black backed and side stripe jackals. At about 11 am blue wildebeest started to cross the track about 50m ahead. We started counting and there were 26 in all, not quite the Serengeti but still very exciting. We also saw a lot of ostrich that day.
I asked Phale what was his favourite part of the job and his exact answer was "Mingling with the poo". That immediately made me think of Chris Packham on Springwatch who is exactly the same. It must be a man thing that transcends culture and continents. On the way back we met the operators of the game farm who live of course miles from anywhere. The wife Anne and her daughter Megan came and spoke to me, very friendly as always here. Anne recognised me from my photo (with Murphy) on the CCB Facebook page! She told me there's a pair of giraffes with a calf on the farm. That I would love to see but we have finished there now. Phale has gone today but I had cleaning and laundry to do and this afternoon Rick and I are doing a bush walk at another game farm called Thakadu so I'll have something different to tell you about. I've got one more day of tracking to tell you about first though.
More later..