Day 7 - Samburu Game Reserve Safari & Samburu Village

We started out early today on a mission to see a Leopard, our final animal of the Big 5.  They are nocturnal and very difficult to see and don’t generally hang out near the roads.  Fortunately, our guide knew the area where they usually hang out and by the time we got there some other groups had already spotted one, mission accomplished.  It was a mother and cub, but not very close, so even with our longest 400mm lens, it was difficult to see.  We spent 2 hours waiting and hoping they would walk a little closer but no luck.  We still enjoyed watching them play around with each other and teasing us by moving from rock to rock.  We wished we would have had the HUGE lenses like the Japanese guys in the next truck, but then again, they would have been a huge hassle to transport and pay for.  See if you can spot the mother and cub leopards in the photo below.

After that we toured around trying to find the even more rare tour bus stuck in the sand.  As luck would have it, we found one owned by the same tour company that we are with.  I got to apply all my Minnesota stuck in the mud skills to free the stuck animal.  The van was carrying a bunch of Brits who were totally useless in helping out in this situation.  There they are standing in the shade off to the right.  That's me and our driver jacking  up the van. 

During our game drive today, the animals we saw for the first time were a Crocodile and a Greater Kudu.  After the game drive, we visited a Samburu village and gave the chief an offering of bananas, oranges, what was left of our box breakfasts, and $20 to take photos of the kids.  You can’t make this stuff up!  Here’s a photo of all the kids shaking Judy’s hand as we were about to leave. 

We returned to our lodge for a late lunch at the restaurant which overlooks the reserve.  As we ate, we saw elephants, monkeys and exotic birds.  Pretty entertaining lunch!  

We really have taken 100’s (Judy’s will probably end up in the thousands) of photographs of the animals.  All we’ve been able to do is download them and delete the obvious bad ones, no editing.  It will be after the trip until we can post them.