After arriving back from Abu Camp I had a few days of surgery back at the MAWS clinic. Pippa has been my relief technician that is filling in for Kelly while she is on holiday in South Africa. Pippa is an ex-pat from the UK. Pippa, KC and I were all scheduled to be off work from January 1st though the 4th. January 3rd was to be Pippa’s 40th birthday so she wanted to get out of town for the days we had off. She asked if I wanted to go to Mena A Kwena with her. I, of course, said YES! You never turn down an opportunity to go to the bush!
http://www.menoakwena.com
Meno A Kwena means teeth of the crocodile. It is a tented safari camp about an hour and a half drive east of Maun on the edge of the Makgadikgadi Salt Pans. It is really nice and low key. The staff and the other guests were fabulous. We arrived there about 6:30pm on New Year’s Eve after a long day of surgeries at the clinic. We had our normal spay/neuter surgeries in the morning and of course we had to have an emergency leg amputation before we left!
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| Our Tent |
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| Inside the tent |
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| River view from the deck |
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| Another view of the river |
New Year's Eve was great. Just before dinner we were treated to an amazing sunset. After dinner we all sat by the fire and drank champagne. I got to know some of the other guests. We all laughed and talked and at midnight we all wished each other Happy New Year and gazed at the stars. I contemplated how bad this last year had been but really tried hard not to dwell on the past. Looking to the future I tried to figure out what I wanted out of this new year. Just as a side note, I did not doctor this picture at all. This is exactly how the sunset looked - amazing!
Pippa and I spent the next couple days just relaxing and reading. I read two books! Guests were coming and going and we got to know each of them. They were from all over the world. Interestingly enough there was a woman from Aspen there one night who owns a Japanese restaurant. She invited me to come up to Aspen and enjoy the restaurant any time. I think I'll do that when I get home!
On January 3rd we made plans to go on a game drive with two other guests, a gay couple from Switzerland. The one guy, Andreas, is a fine art broker and spents most of his time in London and Miami. The other guy was Fancois and he is a swiss banker. They were just delightful! Our guides Kabela and Cam loaded us on the boat and we traveled down the river a little ways. We parked the boat on the opposite bank and walked to a safari vehicle that was waiting for us. We were now in the Makgadikgadi National Park. We drove for a bit and watched a bunch of vultures on a tree. They are super cool birds and I love to watch them. These particular vultures are White Backed Vultures. We were unable to drive deep enough into the bush to see what they were feeding on.
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| Cam and Kabela |
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| Wake of vultures |
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| Cool vulture close-up |
Next we saw an African Wild Cat. Unfortunately, I could not get a photo as they are very skittish and it ran off before I could photograph it. Here is a link in case you wanted to see what they are:
African Wildcat Information
We drove back down to the river and there we saw a huge pod of hippos. They were right on top of each other. There must have been 10 of them but it was hard to tell.
As were were photographing the hippos a huge herd of bachelor elephants came down to the river to drink and play. It was amazing! These guys actually adopted a baby elephant that was somehow separated from it’s mother. It was so cute. I love that elephants do that. I could have watched them all day! They just played and had such a good time. There was also a big mud hole next to the river and they all took turns rolling in it! I didn’t realize they could dive completely under the water. It was insane!
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| Playing |
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| Enjoying a roll in the mud |
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| Hey, play with me! |
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| Reflection |
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| Baby!! |
After watching the elephants for about 2 hours we continued our drive around the park. We saw many, many beautiful birds. Africa has so many! Unfortunately they are often difficult to photograph. I did manage to get one of a lilac breasted roller which is my favorite! :)
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| Lilac Breasted Roller |
We saw some impala and there were also random zebra carcasses laying about....
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| Impala |
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| Impala. Dead zebra carcass in the background |
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| Zebra carcass |
We stopped back by the river and had lunch. The elephants were only about 25 yards from us - so cool! They didn’t seem to mind us much although when we tried to drive away one did challenge us. He did a mock charge just to let us know we were too close. Loved it!
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| Handsome boy! |
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| Mock Charge! |
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| Heading out of the water |
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| Elephant butts |
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| Look how close he is to the vehicle! |
We had the best time with Andreas and Francois. Cool guys. We got back to camp and showered and got ready for dinner. We met some new guests and all exchanged stories from the day.
Meno is a really low-key camp and a great place to just relax. It’s nice because it’s close to town. Being that it’s on the river we had some great wildlife viewing and the sunsets were gorgeous! Very chill.
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| Dusk |
On Sunday morning we drove back to Maun. Two new vets had arrived from Canada and Kelly returned from her holiday in South Africa. I spent the rest of the day working on the blog and readying myself for my next adventure. I have one week left in Maun and then I go back to South Africa for my time with a vet at a game reserve in Port Elizabeth. Looking forward to that so much!
"People travel to wonder at the height of mountains, at the huge waves of the sea, at the long courses of rivers, at the vast compass of the ocean, at the circular motion of the stars; and they pass by themselves without wondering."
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