And so it begins...

We should have been exhausted.  After departing Honolulu on Saturday morning, five flights (HNL to LAX to JFK to JNB to DUR to PHINDA) and 12 time zones later we found ourselves stepping off of an impossibly small plane onto a barely paved runway in the Phinda Forest Reserve on Monday afternoon.

 However, as we met our ranger Matt and saw warthog, nyala and baboon during our short drive to the Phinda Forest Lodge, we were giddy with excitement.

 

After a cocktail greeting, we had a nice lunch on the veranda of the main lodge overlooking the animals at the watering hole in the distance.  Sam, the chef, came out to introduce himself to us after we were done with our meal. 

Then we went and quickly explored our "tent cabin" and changed out of our travel clothes an into our game drive gear.  Prior to our afternoon game drive, we enjoyed some iced coffee and some snacks at the main lodge.  We met our game drive companions (the vehicles hold 6 guests, the ranger and a tracker) who were two very nice couples from Cape Town: Colin and Priscilla and John and Teresa.  As we boarded the vehicle, we also met our tracker, Muzi...and then the fun really began.  As it was our first game drive, the Capetonians let us sit up front.  Here's a shot of Matt in the driver's seat and Muzi in his tracker spot.

Shortly after leaving the lodge we encountered our first "big game".  It was a female giraffe in the sand forest and we were very close. 

Matt said that other rangers had previously seen lion in the area and we'd be looking for them tonight.  Muzi spotted some tracks and after some off-roading into the bush, we stumbled upon a pride of 10 lions (females and sub-adult males).  We were shocked with how close we were able to get.  The lions are apparently used to the vehicles and very relaxed around them as long as nobody stands up or anything to change the silhouette.  We spent about 20 minutes with the lions as they were resting in the shade.

It was really exhilarating to see them in their environment with no walls or fences between us and them.  We were feeling really lucky that we had been able to see so much during our first game drive.

After the lions we drove a little ways away and stopped for a "sundowner", which is a fancy way of saying we had a cocktail break.  The Capetonians had "G&T's" and Devon enjoyed a glass of white wine while Rob had a Castle Lager.  There were also some snacks like Biltong (S. African Beef Jerky), peanuts, and dried pineapple.  It was all very civilized as we watched our first African Sunset with giraffes in the distance.

 

 

After our respite, we were back on the hunt for game.  As it was growing dark, we really had to rely on the skills of Matt and Muzi if we were going to see anything.  As we were driving through the sand forest, Muzi found some fresh leopard tracks.  Matt told us that a mother and her cubs were in the area and he was able to locate them by using the tracks and the alarm call of an antelope.  Muzi, who has the eyes of a hawk, saw the leopard in some trees and shined a spot light in their direction.  For about 15 seconds, everyone in the vehicle held their breath as we spied the mother leopard and her two cubs (we didn't get any pictures).  Then they disappeared back  into the forest and we headed back to the lodge.  We were very content to have seen two of Africa's Big 5 (Cape Buffalo, Elephant, Lion, Leopard, Rhino) during our first game drive.

 

Back at the Lodge, we were greeted again with a drink and security walked us to the main lodge for dinner.  We learned that since the lodge had no fences around it, we'd need to be accompanied by security anytime we moved around at night.  At dinner, our adrenaline rush wore off and we were falling asleep into our plates.  We were only able to put down a few bites of dessert before we had to surrender ourselves back to our tent cabin for bed.  The wake up call for the morning game drive would come at 5am.