| September 2005 and I was back in Africa on my | | | | onto a fallen log in full view, lit by the remaining |
| 6th tour with Guerba doing Faces of Kenya and | | | | daylight. Here it stayed posing for 6-8 minutes |
| Tanzania. It was late afternoon and we had just | | | | allowing all on board to get some excellent photos. |
| entered Samburu National Park making our way | | | | After this it gave us one more close encounter |
| to the Samburu Lodge Camp Site for the night. | | | | as it decided to walk pass the vehicles before |
| On the way we were stopping to view and | | | | disappearing into the bush on it's nightly patrol. |
| photograph the many of the beasties that | | | | As you could guess, the talk around the camp fire |
| existing in the park including Reticulated Giraffe | | | | that night was about the leopard sighting and how |
| (Giraffa camelopardalis reticulata), Elephant | | | | lucky we had been to see one, especially one as |
| (Loxadonta africana africana), Eastern Yellow Billed | | | | photogenic as this one was. Imagine our surprise |
| Hornbill (Tockus flavirostis), and Impala | | | | the following evening when on the way back to |
| (Aepycerous melampus melampus) to name just | | | | camp we came across another photogenic |
| a few. The light was failing and consideration was | | | | leopard in a large acacia tree, who decided to |
| being given to putting the camera gear away by | | | | pose for on branches for about 5 minutes! This |
| many as even a flash would not help. Suddenly | | | | gave us even better shots than the day before. |
| our tour leader Bernard pressed the buzzer to | | | | Bernard our tour leader announced that we were |
| stop the truck and announced that there was a | | | | leopard people and that it was a good omen. We |
| leopard in the tree about 100m behind and to the | | | | saw another three leopards on this trip in |
| right! Straining to see the leopard we all finally | | | | Tanzania! |
| caught a glimpse of the tail and hoped it would | | | | In my 6 tours with Guerba I have been lucky |
| show us more. Patience paid out and in about 5 | | | | enough to see 11 leopards (5 on this trip alone) |
| minutes the leopard came down out of the tree, | | | | and these two sightings have by far been the |
| crossed into the open and promptly jumped up | | | | best and longest I have experienced. |