The photo challenge topic of the week is rounded. And while I contemplated creating a post highlighting all the lovely rounded lines on elephants, I decided instead to offer up a bit more variety.
My Monochrome Monday choice for this week is from a wonderful lion sighting during my time spent in Etosha National Park in Namibia. You really can’t ask for better than this!
We were lucky enough to spend about an hour with this breeding herd in the Namibian Desert. They spent time grazing on devil’s thorn and then went down into the riverbed for a drink and a mud bath. After that, they were off, and we headed back to camp for breakfast.
The WordPress photo challenge topic for the week are things that are distracting, and I need look no further than birds. Just yesterday, while taking my dog for an afternoon walk, a flash of yellow caught my eye in the bush, and I ended up rather mesmerized at the side of the road trying to photograph the birds flitting passed, mostly so I could try and identify them later. Those photos aren’t worth sharing, but I’m no different whilst on holiday either. Birds are definitely one of the things that stop me in my tracks so I can gaze at them in wonder.
The photo challenge prompt for this week is elemental. I was able to find a few photos in the edit queue from my last trip that fit in with this theme perfectly. Here are my images that represent earth, air, water and fire.
The photo challenge prompt of the week is textures. There are a lot of directions that this can be taken; I decided on a combination of animals in their environment and animal portraits.
The second stop on my recent trip to Southern Africa was at the beautiful Ongava Game Reserve adjacent to Etosha National Park. Like at our first camp, here we also found a familiar face, as the camp manager we met on a previous trip to Namibia had moved over to this region, and was running the lodge during our stay. We had a wonderful time catching up with Maggie; I am still amazed that we not only found familiar faces so far from home, but that people remembered us as well 🙂
Typically, we went into the national park to explore on our morning game drives, and the spent the afternoons on the private reserve. The Etosha region had also received higher than average rainfall, and was very lush and green during our stay. Right before we arrived, they had a day of heavy rain, and on our first game drive we ended up stuck in the mud on one of the roads on the Ongava Reserve. After about 45 minutes, our awesome guide Willy managed to get the vehicle moving again. We were all covered in splattered mud from head to toe, but laughing and smiling; its all part of the safari adventure.
We spent time with elephants and rhino, lions and wildebeest. We saw zebra, oryx springbok and impala, and an abundance of birds. The reserve had a lovely hide, but due to the rains in the region, water sources were abundant and the man-made dam near the lodge was not being frequently used during our stay (with the exception of the resident terrapins). It was a beautiful region that I hope I have the opportunity to explore again in the future.
Here are a few images from my 3 nights in this beautiful area.