Saturday 19th April 2014

We had a bi g ele bull through camp last night. He was very relaxed but made some noise as he fed his way down the access road passed my tent and out via the bucket showers after having a drink.

We walked Houtini Gorge this morning, always a lovely walk but today it was a struggle as I felt so ill. Scanning was difficult with a really stiff neck, so much so I almost had to turn around fully to check the guests behind me. I felt so weak by the end of the walk I was barley able to keep my head up.

It was my duty day so once back at camp I had to fill the shower buckets etc before breakfast, then it was off to bed to try and shake off the thumping headache.

Luckily this afternoon’s walk was only a short foray around the fever tree forest for no more than 90 minutes. I probably couldn’t have managed much more, only half way round I was beginning to understand what the phrase “being brought to your knees” meant, I could have easily just dropped to them for some rest.

On our final approach to the vehicle through a particularly stunning part of the Fever Tree Forest, Tina, one of the guests said, “Wouldn’t it be great if we saw an elephant now”. Then no more than five further paces we saw three bulls about 200 metres away. There wasn’t much light left so we couldn’t do an approach, it was more a case of racing them back to the vehicle as they were heading in that direction along the path of least resistance, the road.

On the way back we responded to a leopard sighting along Pafuri Main but unfortunately we had no luck. My neck was really stiff and painful by now which meant I was next to useless operating the spotlight. Back at camp I struggled through dinner and then to bed.