Timbavati Private Reserve - 8 days 7 nights

Thought I'd share our experience with the Safari we were on in May 2018. We went to Timbavati Private Game Reserve on the boundary of Kuregar National park.

this was my third trip to Africa .... once to East Africa back a long time ago and then five years ago to Botswana, Zambia and Zimbabwe. This trip by far was the best. While it was only 8 days and seven nights the time in the bush was perfect. We did exactly what we went there for and that was to see the animals. No visiting schools, villages and getting immersed in the culture. While that is fine if it's what you want we wanted to see animals and specifically Big Cats. So we went on 14 game drives and frankly the length of the program was just right even though that's a long way to travel for 8 days!

Anyway, our first stop was at the Kambaku Safari Lodge within Timbavati and it's was just such a pleasure. Like being with family. The accommodations were really great, the food was excellent and the staff from greeting us to our Ranger guide and Tracker were first class.
And boy did they deliver on the game viewing side. The nice thing about Timbavati is that being a Private Reserve you are able to go off road to seek out the predators. In Botswana, Zambia and Zimbabwe we were not permitted off road which made predator sighting more difficult.

In the first day and a half we saw all of the big five .. .several times and had some incredible sighting which I will try and talk about as we go though this thread...

First thing off the bat we came across a younger female leopard named Sunset Girl. She was beautiful and we watched her for quite a while and then our tracker tracked her on foot after we lost her in the bush so we got to take another look about an hour later...

One more of Sunset Girl...

Later that morning we came upon a heard of Cape Buffalo which was just amazing. They were inquisitive and had several young calfs with them. No close encounters and we enjoyed all the action. Many of the big females and the males too took a special interest in watching us and in exchange gave us some wonderful photo opportunities. Most of the animals are OK with the safari vehicles but staying seated and never getting out of the car is a very good idea. Things change dramatically if any animal feel threatened...

As we traveled around that morning we came to a large lake/watering hole and it was fantastic watching the herd drinking, eating and watching after the young ones...they seemed very protective of the calves...

Being across the lake we were actually able to get out of the vehicles, take pictures and have a nice coffee break at the same time!

Very interesting. Any more to follow.?
Thanks for sharing

avondale87 wrote in post #18682873
Very interesting. Any more to follow.?
Thanks for sharing

Lots!

Have some really cool stuff to share later!

Some good pics so far. Buffalo can be quite dangerous if you are on foot.

As we continued out game drive we came across a beautiful giraffe along the side of the road...

I noticed that in Timbavati we saw less groups of giraffes although a couple of times we saw them in pairs. In Botswana, especially in Chobe, we saw a lot of "towers" of giraffes. They tell me that is the term for a giraffe herd..

Here is one more wondering around in the bush...

We also came across a couple of giraffes crossing the road in front of us at night but under the circumstances was unable to get any decent shots since it happened so fast and it was dark. Even though the tracker was using the spot light it was just to difficult.

Later that day (dusk) we came across our first lion sighting. These were all females and even though it was getting dark we were able to get some nice images.

Some of them walked so close to our safari vehicle you could have easily reached out and touched them. A little tense I have to admit but the animals are so used to the vehicles they don't react asggressively as long as you are quite and don't make a to of sudden movements. We watched them and followed them through the bush for a good half an hour. So amazing!

Here the lions were posing and showing off for us.

Seeing this girl climb on the limbs of a tree was a real treat. She didn't stay up there long and for whatever reason she just never turned her head to get a front on view. You want to call out to call to her or snap your fingers in those situations but not a good idea so you get the best shots you can.

It was an incredible view to see her up on those branches and while some lions do climb into trees is relatively rare...

^ Wow, not a long lens - how close were you to her ?

TustinMike wrote in post #18684099
^ Wow, not a long lens - how close were you to her ?

Like I said there were a lot of times during that sighting where the lions were within 6"-12" of the vehicle. We were really close!

I had to take off the 100-400 and go to the 18-135 because we were just too close.

It was really cool.

As someone that has never traveled much it's wonderful not only seeing the images,but also reading through the words that accompany your encounters.

Thank you and please continue

stu