Khutse GR - Thunderstorms in the desert Day 2

Just enough of a break to get packed, it was a wet and grey morning. 

It was drizzling when the alarm went off at 5am but we had planned for rain by putting our rain jackets in the tent. And shortly after we got out, the rain stopped for a brief period allowing us to get the tent packed away in the dry. 

We packed up the few remaining things into the back of the bakkie and got into the car just as the rain started again. We'd really been hoping that we'd at least have a clear morning before the rain came down, but the Kalahari had different ideas, so we set out on our morning drive to the waterhole with the drizzle hitting us. 

LBJ! - Rufous Naped Lark. 

But it wasn't a few moments later, just past campsite nearest to ours, when Dru suddenly exclaimed "Lion!" There in front of us on the road was a lioness walking on the road. It had been well over a year since our last lion sighting in Khutse and we'd just resigned ourselves to another predator-less trip with all the rain, but you just never know what nature will throw at you. 

Molose finally squeezed out a lion sighting. 

And she wasn't alone. She was soon joined by another lioness on the road. They had their back to us, going in the same direction as we were, but after the second lioness had joined the first one on the road, they paused and seemed to be waiting. And soon enough a third one also stepped onto the road, but then they all crossed and started walking into the bush. 

And with all the rain the bush was pretty thick and it didn't take long for them to disappear from sight. We drove up to where they had crossed the road, and found one of the females staring at us, but she didn't hang around for too long and soon started heading into the bush to the others, leaving us with only sightings on a tail here and there. 

Molose campsite #2, the shade is barely hanging on while the firepit is gone. 

We decided to head to the waterhole and give them some time before heading back, just in case they got back on the road. And you never knew - maybe they were joining other lions at the waterhole? They were headed in that direction. 

Nope. 

Nothing was at the waterhole except the usual resident herd of springbok. We waited around for a while but of course we wanted to go back to the lions. So after checking around the waterhole roads for tracks, of which there were none, we took the drive back towards the lions. We couldn't find them and feared that they had just carried on into the bush, but we decided that rather than just making a u-turn back to the waterhole, we went further down in the hopes that we'd find more lions also heading to the lionesses. 

Even the Springbok seem to have enough of the rain. 

But there weren't even tracks on the road to start looking for lions. we did find a couple of white headed vultures perched on a tree near the road and our theory is that these lions had killed and eaten around there, which would explain the massive flock on vultures at the waterhole the previous day and the full stomachs of the lions that we'd noticed. 

Hoping that the lions had reappeared we headed back on the road to the waterhole and lo and behold, Dru spotted one of the lionesses - almost exactly where we'd lost them. Our arrival seemed to spur them into action and soon all three of the lionesses were walking towards the road ahead of us. Soon enough the 2 younger females got on the road and then stood waiting for the older lioness. 

Summer blooms in the rainy reasons. Some sort of Lilly is our guess.  

She ambled towards the road and then all three of them walked along the road ahead of us. Of course just as there were was a great opportunity to finally get some photos of lions in Khutse, the rains decided to spoil the party and it started to steadily fall. Although Cheryl got a few shots in, the rain was just a bit too heavy to take the chance with the cameras getting too wet. 

The lionesses walked for a while along the road and then suddenly veered off, almost like they'd spotted something in the bush and were thinking of hunting. They started heading into the bush away from the road and then unfortunately disappeared from sight. We stopped and scanned the area, but besides a quick glimpse of one of the lions, we couldn't find them again. 

Surprised to see a Painted Snipe out here in the middle of the Kalahari. 

We hoped that they were eventually heading to the waterhole so we drove there, catching a few Orange River francolins on the road, just as the rain eased and parked there with the hope that the lions would appear. We were entertained by a female Painted Snipe fishing in a small puddle next to the main waterhole, a Botswana first for us, but unfortunately there was no sign of the lions. 

Orange River Francolin family on the road. 

With the rains coming and going, and only wildflowers to photograph, we waited for quite a while in the hopes that any predators may appear. So with a last sighting of the small herd of springbok and a curious, wet yellow mongoose, we decided to leave Molose and do the 25 km trek while it was threatening to rain, to get to Mahureshele in time for lunch. 

Yellow Mongoose, drenched in the rain. 

To do that, we quickly stopped at the nearest empty campsite and prepared our lunch of pasta salad while the rain was still holding off - sorting it out in the rain would be inconvenient at best! It rained on the way to Mahureshele but luckily by the time we got to our campsite, the rain had stopped and we were able to get some of our camp gear out. 

We decided to head to Khutse Pan where there is a waterhole and have lunch there, but by the time we got there the rain had started again, and we were left to sit in the car and eat our lunch at one of the empty campsites. In fact, all the campsites seemed empty - people had wisely decided to stay away with all the rain around. Well, except for us. 

An Acacia of some sort with a two tone bloom. 

We chose what was previously the nicest campsites in the Khutse Pan area to have lunch at. It is always the one booked out first, because it had a big tree that provided proper shade in the heat of the day, but we were disappointed to find that the elephants had recently pulled down a few of the branches, and now there was only a small shade area left. 

Khutse pan #9, was the best shade but also going. 

The rain started again just after lunch but it wasn't too hard so we were back to the waterhole up the road. We were greeted by a small herd of wildebeest that had come to the salt lick near the waterhole so we stopped to watch them. There we were highly amused to find a tortoise walking through the open area and it was as if the wildebeest had never seen a tortoise before. they were following it while sniffing the tortoise almost like they were trying to figure out what it was. 

What the Tortoise!

It was very entertaining, watching this tortoise walking and being trailed by 3 curious wildebeest with their noses to his shell. And even more so when he startled them and they all panicked and took off, giving the tortoise to slowly make his escape into the long grass. 

Not sure the Tortoise was aware of the close watch. 

We decided to take a drive around the pan to the viewpoint as we had plenty of time before it started to get dark. With the rain holding off and even the sun making an appearance we wanted to make the most of it driving around. We stopped at the lookout point, which is on a hill overlooking Khutse Pan before carrying on the wide loop around the pan, expecting it to take about half an hour - in time to catch some nice evening sun and hopefully a cat or 2. 

Instead, ostriches had a different plan for us. As we were driving we spotted a couple of ostriches on the side of the road - a male and female. Nothing unusual in that but then about 20 meters further on the road we spotted a whole bunch of baby ostriches - about 10 of them - and they were running ahead of us. We were concerned that they would keep running ahead and eventually lose touch with the parents and become sitting ducks (well, ostriches) for predators. 

The Ostrich family refused to get off the road. 

So we decided to reverse back past the parents and hope that the youngsters would run back and meet up. And it worked like a charm, except for the fact that the father joined the youngsters on the road instead of the babies getting off the road and joining the parents. 

And so started a very long process of us driving a bit, the father and babies running ahead but refusing to get off the road. Every time we slowed down, they would also but they wouldn't get off the road. If we speeded up with the hopes that they would jump off the road, the male would but the youngsters wouldn't. And we didn't want to chance separating the family so we didn't want to push it too much. This went on for ages, and we could see the babies were tiring with one starting to fall behind. 

Baby Ostriches look nothing like the adult and are tiny for what is a huge bird. 

We had no other road to go off and we couldn't drive offroad either to get around them - so it was just follow and hope they'd get off. Then the worst case scenario happened - 2 of the babies got separated from the rest and got off the road. Now we had a dilemma - we knew the father would stay with the 8 others and possibly leave the other 2. 

So we stopped and then pulled the car off the road as much as we could as the 2 lost babies were now behind us, so we were between them and the rest of the flock. One youngster was brave and ran straight past the car to meet of with the rest of his family, but the smallest and most tired seemed to be too tired or scared and despite the booming calls from the father, refused to follow. 

The safest place is the track and too small to see above the grass. 

The mother had long deserted the family, but the father stayed close by with the youngsters while we waited and eventually the baby summoned his courage and ran through the scrub past the car and back on the road to join his siblings. Relieved we weren't the reason the baby had become lost, we gave them a few minutes rest but then started the car again and we were back on the track, essentially us herding this flock of ostriches along. 

We knew we were finally going to catch a break as we had an intersection coming up. Hoping that the ostriches would go left, but of course they went right - the same direction we needed to go, but Dru put the foot on the accelerator at the intersection where there was a bit of open ground and managed to get around them, where we left them - probably quite tired but with the family together and all babies accounted for. 

Looks scary but a harmless camp critter. 

No doubt Dad would let out a few booming calls and the mother would be able to find them in due course. With the unexpected delay we didn't have much time before the sun set but it didn't seem that wed missed too much and so with a quick check on the empty waterhole we slowly headed back to Mahureshele to our campsite without any predator luck. 

Camp set up, braai on the go on a wet evening. 

It threatened to rain the whole evening and we even put our temporary shelter up but we were lucky and we were able to enjoy our braai rain free listening to the sound of the nightjars flying around before heading to bed as the first raindrops hit the tent.

Decent bush dinner, pork chop and potatoe.