Up before the sun for another game drive. This time, watched the sunrise over giraffes in the park. Found two elephants. They were a bit grumpy and didn't really like us hanging around. Chased our vehicle off several times. Having a wild elephant snorting and coming towards you is a bit unnerving. They get bigger fast. Jonathan turns the engine off when we're close, then stands up in his seat to tell us about them. Whenever they start to give warning signs, he's very quick to drop back in his seat, fire up the engine, and start driving away. Thankfully, the engine starts up every time. Whew. He got a call over the walkie that the lions were grumpy this morning, and says, "let's go see". After being run off by grumpy elephants several times, I'm a little nervous as we open the gate to enter the lions territory. We discuss briefly who should be the one to jump out and be left behind if we have to leave in a hurry. We find the lions right away. They are clearly alert and watchful. We keep a "respectable distance", which is still pretty close. After watching them a bit, they start pointedly moving towards us. Jonathan quickly gets us moving back towards the gate, stating that we should get out of their before they block our only exit. There are two gates for this area, but the other isn't working. I'm happy to move out of the lion's den.
We found zebra and some other animals. Jonathan tells us about a lot of the plants as well. Like which ones to eat, brush your teeth with, and the one with tasty milky looking sap that will kill you. Didn't try that one. We drove around for a while looking for the cheetahs, but they were hiding. We did see a lot of cheetah food about; a herd of 60 that is now only a couple dozen.
Back to the lodge for breakfast. Then, Tabi and the students left for a 3 hour drive to the highest bungee jump in the world. They just *had* to go. A concept I just don't get. I don't want to walk on that bridge, let alone jump off it. Ronny and I stayed at the lodge and visited the cheetah conservation center where we finally got to see some cheetahs up close. Adorable kitties. I want one. The we visited the reptile center and Jonathan let us hold one of the snakes. They have lots of snakes, some crocodiles (we didn't get to hold those), and a few turtles. We had lunch and Ronny left for another game drive for kids. The only other "kids" with him were 3 teenage girls. I took advantage of some time alone to work. After dinner, the boy and I were walking from the restaurant to the lodge and ran into a bush hog (similar to a wart hog). It was 10 feet away and coming towards us when Ronny spotted him and panicked. All I saw was a giant beast with horns that shouldn't be running loose coming for us in the dark. Scared the crap out of both of us. Turns out, he lives under the porch at the lodge. Can't believe no one warned us about that!
Students survived the bungee jump, but didn't get back to the lodge until 8:30, and it was 1 am by the time we were back home in Cape Town. Longest day ever!
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