Well, hello there. I hope that you are fabulously well and have had a lovely weekend. Here in the Luangwa to be honest with you where to start. We have had an incredibly busy start to the season I feel like I am barely getting to sit behind my computer and update you with what is happening. So here we go, a little round up from the last couple of weeks starting off with a truly wonderful Martial Eagle sighting that Paul had up at Tena Tena.
Spotting this enormous bird Paul stopped the car so that everyone could enjoy it then suddenly the Martial took off from a tree and landed not too far away on the ground. There was quite a commotion with wings flapping – and let me tell you a Martial Eagles wings are pretty big! At the same time the franklins were going completely berserk and were flying off every which way possible. As the car crept a little closer, they noticed that the Martial had in fact caught a franklin and then proceeded to take off and take its dinner up into a nearby tree.
Whilst on the subject of catching one’s dinner how about some amazing action at Luangwa Safari House. In the morning (obviously whilst the guests were out on a game drive) the staff were getting the house ready for the guests return and out on the deck busy sweeping away the fallen leaves the groundsman looked up to see the Nkwali pride of lion chasing buffalo. Wow! they obviously had a failed hunt that morning and after doing what lions do best during the middle of the day they were fully rested and got back up to find the buffalo and successfully killed one just infront of Robin and Jo’s house.
You can imagine the commotion entailed with such a thing and then all the resident hyenas also joined the party. And the fun didn’t stop there as the researchers have been following this pride periodically for years and because it lives in the Game Management Area, they like to keep track of the pride in case of any human/wildlife conflicts. As they were seen and settled the researchers also took up the opportunity to pop a collar on one of the lions so that they are more easily able to track them and closely monitor if they do move towards any villages. The following morning needless to say there was not far to go for the morning game drive!
The elephants are now crossing the river regularly and they have their favourite spots and one of them remains in front of Nsefu. There really is something incredibly magical about waking up in the morning, opening the doors to your room and looking out to the sight of them splashing their way through the water. The hippos meanwhile are slightly less impressed and refuse to give up their patch of ground as the water levels continue to drop almost daily so and I am sure within the next few months there will be some competition between the big males for river space.
Whilst on the subject of splashing through the water big pride from the main game-viewing area decided to give it a go and have a few nights vacation from the park including passing through the Nkwali workshop as well as past our house. They soon realised however that the grass is not always greener and soon went back into the park where they promptly killed and ate a buffalo just to remind everyone that they were back.
We also have a few trail cams set up in the camps including Luangwa Safari House and Robin’s House and while it’s quite an arduous task to sift through hours of footage at a time, it’s quite rewarding coming across gems like a leopard walking outside Robin’s House (watch here), a large hippo having a munch (watch here) or some very curious bats who flew right up to the camera for a closer look. It made for some brief but funny close-ups from the South Luangwa night shift! (watch here).
So, there you have it, another action-packed week here in the Luangwa and every day we look forward to hearing what’s new and what’s happening. We hope to head up to our Mobile Walking Safaris in the next week or so and so shall absolutely give you an update on how the season is going up there. But for now, it’s that time of the day for me to say goodbye and hope that you have a fantastic week ahead with plenty of smiles and laughter and don’t forget to look after one another.
