Guide Pangannai Moyo reflects on an exciting early morning game drive in Kruger on the Zimbabwe Botswana Game Tracker tour..

Click on the links for the animals sounds to make you feel like you were there, in the moment)

“For me, one of the most exciting seasons to be in the African bush is when everything is lush and green, either during or after the rainy the season.

I was really looking forward to this Zimbabwe Botswana tour as you get to spend so much time in the bush, game viewing. You’re not rushing because you only have limited chances of seeing game, you can stop, listen and wait and this is when you end up seeing the best sightings.
On our second day of the tour we took off at dawn after a quick breakfast and drove along the famous Letaba River in the northern part of Kruger. We always leave as early as possibly because dawn and dusk are really your best game viewing times and as you will read, we were not disappointed.

We drove looking at tracks and listening to the early morning sounds of the bush. The Francolins and Guineafowl were calling and running through the green grass – their calls are some of my favourite. Everyone was wide awake and keenly scanning the bush, everyone (including me) wanted to be the first person to spot something!

Before we could spot anything, we heard a hyena call, “whoooop” as we came around the corner we were rewarded with an awesome sighting of a pack of well fed vocal hyenas heading to the den before sunrise. We sat and watched them until it was time and to move and when we started up again, it wasn’t long until there were heard a group of Francolin and Guineafowl alarm calling. We stopped, wondering what the commotion was all about. There were also few impalas who suddenly took notice of the noise and it wasn’t 2 minutes and a stunning leopard emerged from the long grass, only meters away from the impala.

As soon as the impala saw him they jumped and ran, spooked by his presence and within seconds they had vanished leaving the poor leopard disappointed and a silent truck full of stunned onlookers. Although the leopard did not pursue the impala we got a wonderful view of him and before long, the typically elusive cat had quietly removed himself from the limelight and walked into the bushes and out of sight. We stayed on a while, hoping that he would reappear, wishing for a second glimpse of this beautiful creature, but it was not to be and so we proceeded on with the rest of our game drive.
Our morning continued with great sightings stopping to look at some vultures perching quietly and patiently on a dead ebony tree, we spotted a yellow billed kite and when we got to a waterhole, stopped to spend some time quietly watching a hippo.

It was such an exciting early morning drive and we were all buzzing with excitement. This was only day 2 and to top it off – we were the only people to see all of this.

This was a morning I won’t forget quickly and I love being able to share these rare and amazing moment with my clients.”