Etosha National Park
Sept 11th — 14th, 2018
Things move slowly and swiftly all at once in Etosha National Park. You can be sitting at a waterhole for hours then suddenly the dry barren scene drastically changes, and a family of elephants saunters past your vehicle to take a much-needed sip of water and indulge in a playful bath.
Waiting is the name of the game here. Like a secret orchestra, the parade of life reveals its notes to you at its own pace. First, the prey arrives — herds of springbok and impala cautiously approach the shallow pool, exercising nature’s age-old defense method of safety in numbers. Then, the dazzles of zebras arrive. They come in groups as small as three or four, and in crowds ranging in the hundreds. Occasionally, lone stallions appear. The zebras exercise less grace than the antelope. They snort, scuffle, and gallop their way to and from the water oasis. Suddenly, jennies of giraffes emerge from the bush. They slowly saunter over to the water source, situate their front two legs into a split, lower their lengthy necks, and use their 20-inch tongues to take a sip. Once they are satiated, they zip back up in one fell swoop.
Weaving in between the medium to large size prey are families of warthogs, flocks of helmeted guineafowl, and the lone honeybadger; darting back and forth from the safety of the bush and the waterhole. Finally, the predators arrive. Typically this consists of birds of prey — vultures, hawks, and eagles — and small hunters like the jackal. If you’re lucky, you’ll see the larger stalkers. Our luck in spotting these was few and far between. We were only privy to sightings of one spotted hyena, one lion, and a family of three cheetahs. Which, I guess, is not so bad for our first African safari.
Sitting there, waiting for life to show up, afforded me with a lot of time to reflect and contemplate. I found myself drawing parallels with nature and daily life. Observing the animals and their keen ability to be acutely aware, reminded me of the importance of knowing your surroundings. Watching the waterhole scenes suddenly change from one moment to the next, taught me that you can search and plan all you like, but life shows up when it wants to. It has its own agenda and rhythm. The best thing to do is to ride it out, observe, and enjoy.
3 Highlights:
- Tracking the animals in the game-spotting booklet we purchased at our resort’s gift store. I felt like a giddy little kid every time I could check the box next to the picture of each animal spotted. It was like a safari version of BINGO. In the end, we spotted 28 out of the 42 mammals the park is home to, 24 species of birds, and 1 reptile — the Common Marsh Terrapin (aka waterhole turtle).
- Early morning drive through the park. One morning we took a drive through half the park. I’m glad we did, as it was a completely different experience from sitting and waiting at the waterholes. Like an old-time silent movie, random scenes would pop in and out of the scrolling window, in jolted and sudden ways. The landscape would change drastically and instantly from the heavy bush, to open fields, to salt covered pans. Interestingly, most of the game we saw was alone and not in herds as often is the case at waterholes. By the end of our drive, we spotted 5 rhinos, an ostrich in the forest, several lone bull elephants, and lots of independent roadrunners.
- Zebra cuddles. This was fascinating to me. Often throughout our drives, we would see two zebras embraced in what appeared to be a neck hug. They would do this everywhere — along the road, in the open fields, surrounding the waterholes, and throughout the day — in the morning dew, during the midday heat, and under the cover of dusk. It was lovely and heartwarming to see. After researching online, I read that Zebras do this to establish and reinforce social bonds amongst each other. Learning this made it even more endearing to me!
