Elephant, Antelope Park

The elephants are being rehabilitated as well. More great opportunities to get close and personal.

For those who are interested in knowing more, the park's webpage is

www.antelopepark.co.zw/

Lions, Anetlope Park

These teenage lions are being rehabilitated to return to the wild. So they are "temporarily captive", and "half-tame"... enough so for small groups of people to walk with them. Which my sister and I did, and which led to some delightful portraits. Especially of the young lioness, still light enough to put herself up a tree and seemingly young enough not to know what to do with herself once she was there. I was laughing all the way through the film, thrilled.

Baby mantis, Harare

This infant on a eucalyptus tree is only a few mm long, but was steady and fearless enough for me to creep up with my closeup equipment.

Crocodile farm near Victoria Falls

Although the USA considers crocodiles threatend, they are being farmed in Zimbabwe, their meat, skeletons and fabulous leather all used.

Hwange: Waterbuck

Our safari also took in parts of Hwange National Park, and the pose of these waterbuck with the tree seemed to me to be an African postcard in the making.

Sikumi: Wild dog

Quite rare, numbering a few thousand in Africa. We were already becoming quite blase about elephants (which were ahead on the road), on this our third safari, especially when this mother and her family appeared. We were seeing them for the first time, and they were happy to stay where they were, letting us get quite close.

Sikumi: Dawn buffalo herd

This was a magic moment, a gift. I could see in the early morning light of the safari that the sunlight would stream through the dust and turn these buffalo into something mysterious, identifiable only by their silhouettes, especially the horns. Once we got past them and looked back into the sun, I got what my inner vision was telling me would come - one of those happy occasions when vision and actuality line up and agree.

Sikumi: Giraffe pair

Quick, what noises do giraffes make? Apparently they cannot make a sound with their vocal cords - maybe they don't have any?

Sikumi: Monkey

A common sight, but with manual focus equipment they gave me enough challenges in their antics. This one, however, was resting in the sun.

It's critter time on the blog!

Sikumi Park: Buffalo

Four safaris, dawn and dusk, in open vehicles, showed us most of what Zimbabwe has to offer in wildlife. I was seeing this country for the first time as an adult and a photographer, and didn't waste the opportunity. Welcome to the buffalo, Africa's meanest, most dangerous vertebrate (probably the mosquito, carrying malaria, should be called its deadliest animal overall).