Chapter 2: The Safari | Day 7, Cats & Dogs

It’s just after 7am on Friday morning. Sadly, this is our day of departure. We were allowed to sleep in for the first time in nearly a week. But, as the sun rose over the Hwange Wilderness this morning, so did I. Living out here has synced my internal clock with the natives. The latest we have been up is 11pm, but it takes effort, and alcohol, once the sun goes down. The same is true when the sun rises. Am I the mongoose now?

I’m enjoying a French press coffee on the deck. Tara is still asleep. She must be a night predator. My little lioness. Dreaming about her cubs back home. Rumby stopped by at our allotted wake up time and delivered a thermos of hot water to make coffee. This has been the tradition since arriving. A light wrap on the house, a delivery of hot water, boiled over an open fire. Today I met her out front, returning her smile and good morning blessings. I don’t want to leave here. But, as always, I’m jumping ahead. You just arrived.

—--

“Good morning.” I hear from a soft voice through the open windows of our little villa. I’ve been lying in bed for 10 minutes, listening to the early morning critters and birds begin to stir. Our hot water had been delivered at 5:30. It’s now 5:45. It’s Tuesday morning. Our first day in the bush. Our first safari!

As I turn on my headlamp to a soft blue light, I smile. Tara asked me while packing back in Denver why I would bring this. Allowing her to sleep a few extra minutes, while I prepare her coffee is reason enough.

I throw on some shorts, a tee shirt and a puffy vest. All of my items had been laid out thoughtfully the night prior. This is my first day of school, and I want to look sharp for my old and perhaps new friends. Tara does the same, and we walk the 100 feet, through the sand, to the main open-air building where we are to have breakfast until 6:30.

“My name is Charlie,” a jovial white gentleman shares as he shakes my hand in the dining room. His name and accent are a dead giveaway. ‘What part of London are you from’ I think to myself. “And this is my wife, Janie.”

Scott and Tricia sit down, and I dig into my bowl of corn flakes, peanut butter toast, and boiled egg, none of which I would eat back home but all sounded so delicious, and safe, in our new habitat.

“There has been a spotting of wild dogs. We leave in 3 minutes.” Stanley announces upon entering the room. We met our week’s guide last night at dinner. As we inquired about the animals we might see this week, wild dogs were lowest on the list.

“There are only 1,000 left” he told us with a sad look.

“In the reserve?” I asked.

“In all of Africa.” He clarified.

“We’d better go” Charlie announced to us all, three minutes later. Count on the person who lives in the shadow of Big Ben and ground zero for the globe’s time system to keep us on task.

The drive to the gate that both encloses our encampment, and opens to the national reserve takes about 4 minutes. After stopping at the entry point to log our names on the park’s registry, Stanley throws the Land Rover into first gear and we begin crawling through the soft sand, following tire tracks as the vehicle rocks back and forth. We are a little boat on the water, the Hwange waves tossing us gently side to side. I’m in the first row with Tara and will learn later that sitting in the back exaggerates the movement - beware to any of you that have motion sickness, your safari would not last long. The Arthurs are in the middle seats, and our new English comrades have taken up the rear.

After plying the seas for 15 minutes, we round a bend and notice a pack of dogs around something on the ground up ahead. Stanley slowly crawls forward until we could almost reach out and pet the colorful dogs.

“What keeps the dogs from jumping into our vehicle?” I ask, the memory of my Rhino attack as fresh as the meat these savage canines are devouring.

“They cannot see you.” Explains Stanley. “The animals look at the vehicle and only see a metal box. We are not a threat to them. But please keep your feet and arms inside the vehicle, or they will see you.” I inch a little further from the outside, imagining shaking loose a dog that has happily discovered some arm candy.

We remain there for 30 minutes, quietly watching the 7 dogs rip apart a Cape Buffalo that had been killed the night prior, according to our guide. The bloody ribs highlighted an empty cavity that the lions had taken, but the dogs were clearly happy with the remains. Some were nuzzle-deep in the head of the carcass while others literally took up the rear. I was fascinated by their hungry attack on the animal, yet playful nature. Glancing at Tara, I wondered how the daughter of a veterinarian was enjoying the show. She was looking away.

“Ok?” Stanley asked. His simple cue to keep going. ‘Ready’, we all said in unison. While we pulled away, I recalled seeing Stanley taking pictures on his phone as well and recalled last night’s conversation. ‘1,000 wild dogs in all of Africa’, he had said. We just saw 7 of them. Had this kill happened a few kilometers away, or 100 meters into the bush, we would have missed it. But right there on the road, in the light of the morning, we witnessed something only a fraction of a fraction of career guides had ever observed. Charlie, who has family in Zim and has been on dozens of safaris informed us that what we just saw was anything but normal.

And, driving by a dazzle of Zebras, a few warthogs, and a lone Jackel, we again stopped in utter amazement. A lioness was walking slowly across the open sandy plains, being followed by three tiny lion cubs. Every few minutes, she would pause to let them play, or respond to their high-pitched meows. ‘Pick me up, mom’ they demanded. She would reach down and grab one by the back of the neck, continuing her slow walk as a cub dangled from her mouth like a piece of jewelry. A furry pendant, swinging with each step of her sleek body.

“Ahem. This, too, is abnormal” Charlie informed us with a knowing grin. The tiny beeps of camera’s focusing, and the ‘click, click’ of shutters was the only sound. Unlike the yelps, tearing meat, and playful growls of the dog encounter, this observation is happening in near silence. Stanley starts the car again and moves forward, nearly cutting off the path of the lioness and her young family. Without a flinch, she walks in front of the vehicle and I realize how useless my telephoto lens is in this moment, unless I want to count the number of whiskers on her nose. Again, I check to make sure no limb of my body or any of my friends is protruding from the vehicle.

“Stanley, can you show us an elephant giving birth now?” Scott requests after the lions have disappeared into the underbrush. Stanley smiles, we all laugh. What could possibly top the last hour, the first hour, of this morning’s safari? Do we go back, pack up, and fly home now, I wonder.

—--

After a sit-down lunch under the massive Camelthorne tree that forms a shaded canopy over our lodge’s deck, Stanley announces we should be back here at 3pm to have high tea. “We will leave for our evening’s safari at 3:30”, he instructs.

Though we sat for much of the 5-hour morning safari, we all remarked on how famished we were by lunchtime. And now that I had a full belly, I realized I could fall asleep in an instant. Tara and I walked back to our villa, and I shed my clothes, eager to try out our cold plunge on the roof. I jumped in, and water splashed over the side, off the deck, and showered the sandy front lawn below. A quick gasp, as the day’s heat gave way to an arctic bath. After a minute, I climbed out and stood naked in the African sun, refreshed.

After an hour’s nap, we walked back to the common area and were met by tea and cake. We all opted for an afternoon cocktail or wine, and our guide playfully commented on our choice of beverages. He informed us that before going back into the park, we would be walking to visit the rhinos. Walk? I gulped, nearly choking on my vodka tonic. But I eagerly fell in beside our guide at the front.

No more than a stone’s throw from the lodge, we come upon two white rhinos, calmly grazing on the tall brown grass surrounding our encampment.

“This is Thuza and Kusasa” He reveals. Thuza means ‘to push’ and Kusasa indicates ‘tomorrow or the future’. He explains that the rhinos live within the fenced area of our lodge and the nearby village. The “Cobras” are the armed guards that are with them 24 hours a day to protect them against poachers.

“Are their AR’s designed to kill an animal or a human?” I ask, finally realizing that unlike in Colorado, where a ranger might carry a gun to protect against bears, these guys are protecting the animals against humans.

“They are here to shoot a poacher. Who”, he continues, “will have killed you first before taking down the rhino.”

We learn that the Chinese grind up the horn of the rhino and ingest it, believing that it is a natural aphrodisiac. One horn’s black-market value can be as high as $2m. In a country where clean water is a luxury, it’s no surprise how poaching has wiped out the rhino population over the last 20 years.

“There used to be thousands of rhinos in the Hwange.” Stanley informs us. “These are the only two, now”.

And as we climb into our vehicle for this afternoon’s safari, I begin to understand the fragile balance of life out here. There is an economic chasm that is forcing Africans to eradicate their own backyard of a beloved creature, and risk their own life, only to survive. Once more, I am reminded of the continent’s plight against the forces of a planet that have long been taking her resources and casting her aside.

—--

“Harris found my glasses!” Charlie informs all that afternoon. During the morning’s safari, his case disappeared on its own safari out of the back of our Land Rover. Rather than retrace our morning’s path, Stanley put a missing child’s alert out to the other guides. The black case, appropriately labeled in white lettering ‘Where Did I Put My Glasses?’ was discovered near the pack of wild dogs. Those English. Always good for a chuckle, and clearly in need of Sherlock’s services.

“What a good omen this must be,” Charlie suggested. “Our good man Harris has saved the day. Let’s all hope Kamala does the same in this evening’s debate.”

Tonight, presidential hopeful Kamala Harris will be squaring off against Donald Trump in the first, and potentially only, debate of the imminent election. ‘I hope you’re right, old boy’ I think to myself.

The afternoon’s discoveries were less exhilarating, but equally enjoyable. We drove to a “pan”, which is the guide’s vernacular for a watering hole. There, we observed our first set of hippos, floating just below the pond’s surface. The hippo spends her entire day in the water, staying submerged for up to six minutes before surfacing up for a puff of air. I found it highly unsanitary that their water bowl doubles as a toilet bowl, and cringe as I notice the elephants drinking thirstily at the water’s edge.

This same pan brings us face to face with Zimbabwe’s gigantic rodents, the majestic elephant. The population of elephants on the continent has multiplied dramaticly, wreaking havoc on the vegetation. They strip off the bark of trees to chew on the soft inner skin, which kills the source of their treat. This coupled with their main course of grass, which they mow at a rate of up to 100 kilos per day, explains the sandy desert of tree stumps.

“They also dig for the roots of plants and grass,” Stanley explains, “So they are natural tillers of the land. When the rains come, this vast desert of sand will bloom with grass up to three feet tall.” None of us can imagine this beach transforming into a green oasis.

Observing the elephants is mesmerizing. We watch a family approach the pan, and are drawn to the baby, no more than a month old, galloping playfully down to the water’s edge. The trunk of the newborn has not fully developed, and his appendage swings erratically with each nod of his head. Once at the shoreline, we laugh at the little guy’s attempt at utilizing his undeveloped straw.

“It’s like watching one of our kids figure out a fork at 2,” Tara observes with a smile.

The mother expertly draws water into her trunk, and curling it up to her mouth, takes a long drink. Several attempts of this confuse the baby and he resorts to splashing the water into his mouth. This too is a failure, and just as our baby’s would throw the fork and hungrily snatch their food with pudgy little fingers, he finally dunks his entire head below the surface to enjoy a drink.

Eventually, as the African heat lamp begins to sink in the sky, Stanley drives us to a small open pasture where we can enjoy our first nightly “sundowner”. He pours a gin and tonic for the Englishman, white wine for the ladies, and a couple beers for the Americans, and we celebrate a successful day. We enjoy our cocktails, as we observe a journey of giraffes quietly forage for food in the tree branches nearby.

The chaos of Cape Town can only now be appreciated fully, juxtaposed against this near silent moment on the savannah.

“I am so relaxed,” Scott shares with me, in a soft voice that rarely accompanies him.

“Me too, pal,” I agree, watching the sun dip below the horizon. Me too.