On leaving the lodge we found a cheetah sitting on a termite mound in front of the lodge; what a way to start our drive! We spent quite some time with him as he was very relaxed; then to everyone’s surprise a small herd of impala moved onto the open area and the hunt was on. The impala had not seen him and by the time they caught on it was too late. He chased an impala ewe across the open area and caught her just before she ran into the long grass. We couldn’t tear ourselves away from this sighting and spent most of the drive with him as he slowly feasted on his meal. Once we moved off we came across some lions sleeping in some shade; they were clearly very tired as they hardly moved at all while we were with them. We slowly started making our way back to the lodge but found a large breeding herd of buffalo first.

Our afternoon drive started with an elephant bull slowly grazing on the driveway. We started making our way west and found a lonesome buffalo bull lying in a pan wallowing in the mud. Following up on the cheetah that had been seen on the morning drive we found him lying in a thicket; his belly was extremely big as he had had a substantial meal. Next we found Karula, female leopard, as she was resting in a tree and offered us great photographic opportunities. While we were still enjoying this sighting a small breeding herd of elephants passed right by us. We spent quite some time here and enjoyed the interaction between the leopard and these magnificent creatures; Karula was very wary of them but stayed hidden on the branch. Further on we had a great sighting of the four Mapogo male lions; these are awesome lions and they are feared by all.