Tuesday, April 20, 2010

In the park ... at last

Well, finally we arrived at the gates into the Kgalagadi Transfrontier park. The check-in went smoothly, although one could clearly see we were no longer in a fast-paced city, but out on the fringes of the desert (and the edge of civilization!). Nothing was done in any kind of hurry, or with any form of urgency..... but it was done, and in a reasonably friendly manner.


Then off to our chalet just accross the way. Interestingly this reception area is also a border post between South Africa and Botswana, and due to the renovations and developments taking place you actually cross over into the Botswana section to go around to the rest camp, which is back on the South African side.
This is a view of the chalets on the Botswana side from the South African camp.



Taken as the sun was setting, so you can see the sun reflecting off the chalets, with the dark clouds in the background. Interestingly, one of the things Ria had said, was that she would love to be in the Kalahari when it rains! Well, she got her wish, it actually rained three time whilst we were there!

One of the first animals we saw once we were in the park was this:


The yellow mongoose. I was quite excited but came to realise as the trip went on, that these little animals have become quite habituated to humans in the camps and are frequently seen scavenging around for tidbits.

The Yellow Mongoose (Cynictis penicillata), sometimes referred to as the Red Meerkat, is a small mammal averaging about 1 lb (1/2 kg) in weight and about 20 in (500 mm) in length. A member of the mongoose family, it lives in open country, from semi-desert scrubland to grasslands in Angola, Botswana, South Africa, Namibia, and Zimbabwe.
As many as twelve subspecies of yellow mongoose have been described. In general, the yellow mongoose has lighter highlights on the underbelly and chin, a bushy tail, and a complete lack of sexual dimorphism. Southern yellow mongooses are larger, have yellow or reddish fur, longer fur, and a longer tail with a characteristic white tip. Northern subspecies tend towards smaller size, grey colouration, a grey or darker grey tip to the tail, and shorter hair more appropriate to the hotter climate.
The yellow mongoose is carnivorous, consuming mostly arthropods but also other small mammals, lizards, snakes and eggs of all kinds. (credit wikipedia)


Another of the regulars one sees in the evenings and early mornings are the geckos, they tend to go to the lights so they can catch the numerous insects that flock to them at night:



This is Bibron's gecko (Pachydactylus bibronii) and is a moderate-sized gecko that when fully grown reaches between 6 and 8 inches. It has a stockier build than most other geckos. The female is generally smaller than the male. Its base color is brown, and it has a beaded pattern dorsally, with horizontal black strips and white dots. The belly is white or very light brown. Newly-hatched Bibron's geckos' line and color patterns look solid while the adults' appear to be more broken. The female sometimes lacks the white dots.
Bibron's gecko is arboreal and ground-dwelling. It is territorial, and males are very aggressive toward each other. Individuals can commonly be found missing appendages in the wild. The female usually lays two clutches per year, with two eggs per clutch. These geckos are very fast runners. Also, they are good at hiding in leaves or on rocks.

This species is distributed across the southern part of the African continent. It is common in South Africa, where it is one of the largest gecko species. (credit wikipedia).

After a nice meal, we settled down for our first night in the park. Only to be woken up a little later with bats flying around inside our chalet!, Well there didn't seem to be much that we could do about it so we went back to bed. We woke up the floowing morning to find that Ria's bed had been the target of the bats latrine activity over night .....eeeoww! Anyway we were up and washed, and headed off to the next camp: Mata Mata some +-120km away, over dirts roads with a speed limit of 50km per hour, and hopefully some interesting game viewing along the way. But that's for another post.

all the best
Ivan
http://www.andersen.co.za/

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