Last friday Selby and I were in the company of 5 very lucky ladies. We left for afternoon safari at normal time and since the ladies had come from Kruger the request was for “CATS”. So we headed off in the direction of where we thought Nthombi was keeping her cubs. As we were about to round the last corner Selby shouted PANGOLIN. And true enough there it was, we called it in and it was as though we had found the winning lottery ticket. There were guides from all over coming to see this rare animal, for many their first time.

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May has proven to be a hectic month for Umlani – not only on the animal sightings front but also on the human side of things!

The first weekend in May found Umlani managing a wedding for no less than 170 guests! Although the wedding was held on our neighbouring property, Keer Keer, Umlani staff assisted – and what a terrific job was done by all making it a truly memorable occasion for everyone.

Staff and wedding guests and of course not forgetting the happy couple Rob and Tania! There were many highlights of course but one memorable one was Umlani hosting dinner for 170 in our riverbed on the night before the wedding. We kept it simple – no chairs or tables – just a great poikje and accompaniments, chocolate brownie for dessert, several fires in the riverbed for light – it was magical!

We let the bush and Umlani work its magic on the guests getting everyone in the right mood for the wonderful wedding day the following morning. It was very hard work but what a blast! We have just about caught up on sleep now!

Moving onto the animals now – wow – we have to start with the amazing sighting of a pangolin! Mid May one of our vehicles was lucky enough to be close to the very rare sighting of this elusive animal!

All of us in camp were extremely envious and this caused a real buzz amongst all the bush teams in the central section of the Timbavati!

Lions: Again May has proven to be exceptional for lion encounters. On the drives the Machaton female with the three sub adult males seems to have re-established herself locally to Umlani after having disappeared for about 8 months! We thought that she was dead! One incredible incident occurred one morning with this group by camp.

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Wonderful rains in April have ensured that everything is still quite green.  Dams and even some pans, still have water

Night time temperatures are now as low as 5 degreesC, but days are very warm (24degrees)

Animals are comfortable with the tar road.  Speeding has caused the death of both a rhino and a baby elephant recently.  Please tell your friends to drive slowly

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Wow, of all of the months to pick to be on long leave, I would chose the one when Nthombi’s cubs became stars, when the Jacaranda Pride grew in size and became “near resident”, and well, I guess I have to bring it up, when two pangolin sightings occurred!!!! 

Jealousy does not even begin to describe it!!!  But thank you to Grant and Keith for your excellent blogs and keeping me up-to-date and making me miss the bush during my long leave!

The good news is that I am back, and surprisingly, haven’t chased all the animals away yet! 

Stuck mostly behind the scenes on my first few days back, I did get out on a few staff bumbles and got to see our enlarged Jacaranda Pride! 

So wonderful to see a group of eight adult lions like that!  Fingers crossed that they stick around!

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