Little Kwara (Part 2)

Welcome back!  This is the continuation of yesterday's post, Little Kwara (Part 1).  So, I still have stories from the first day there.  When we went out for our afternoon game drive, we wanted to follow the lions, because the guides knew they would be hunting that day.  The big question was, which group do we follow?  The one with 2 females and 3 males, or the one with 3 females?  They knew we would see more hunting if we followed the lionesses, but we could see a fight amongst the males if their lionesses caught something.  You could tell that the males hadn't been eating too well; it was actually a little sad to see the ribs of one of them.  My problem is that I don't ever want to see an animal run for its life, only to get snatched down an eaten.  Conundrum!  Well, we went back to where the lions were, but they had already left.  So, we went to where the lionesses were, but they were gone too.  So, KB went to work, and we started tracking.  Unfortunately, we were out for four hours and couldn't find them back.  Fortunately, we got to see lots of other amazing things!

My first elephant!!  Now, you have to understand that I was told by Steve that we might not see any elephants while we were there, because they aren't too common. in that area  So imagine my elation when I saw this one the first day; I was giddy!

There were hundreds of red lechwe gathered by the lagoon; they were jumping back and forth over the river a lot.  I think they were just messing with the crocodile that was waiting in the water. This is my favorite picture of one jumping.

My first hippo!  This guy was hilarious.  He was in the water, saw us coming, and ran out.  Then he would mock charge us, but as soon as Steve started the engine on the car, he would retreat.  

  This happened 3 times before he got scared and decided to run off and hide in a bush.

Seriously, he ran up to a bush, stuck his head in there and waited.  He would pop out, see that we were still there, run to the other side, and hide his head again.  Poor guy.  I loved it.

Also, look at its cute little bird friends!  They follow the hippos and elephants everywhere.

We had such a great time driving around and seeing the animals.  We went to another watering hole and found that there was a baby hippo and 3 adults in the water.  In the reeds near the water, there was another male hippo, desperately wanting to get in.  The problem was, there was already a male hippo there, protecting the females and the baby (fun fact- most of the time, female hippos have to protect the babies from the males, who try to kill them).  We actually got to see a fight take place between the 2 males!  That was really cool.  The poor loner lost the battle and had to run off and find another place to cool off.  My heart is too big for these animals...I wanted to cry at the thought that nobody wanted him around.  I need to toughen up, I think.  Also at that watering hole?  Elephants!!  We stayed there for at least an hour, watching all the animals (also, more crocodiles and tons of birds).  Here are a couple of pictures from that time:

And finally (because it's now lunch time and I have to go...):

Believe me, there are many, many more pictures for you to enjoy!  Still working on uploading them, but as soon as I can, I will post the link.  Hope you enjoyed this installment of Roger and Ashley's Adventures in Botswana!