Short blog today – (we’re sure you’re grateful), it’s all about the Lion. We were up at 5 for the game drive and look what we found

A bit about lions who have a magnificent mane like the one above extending from their head to their shoulders and chest. A top predator who is at the top of the food chain without any natural predators of its own. They spend 20 out of 24 hours just resting, 2 or so hours walking and an hour or so eating. The female lioness will often do the hunting, obviously carnivores so no shortage of prey to choose from here. They will usually eat at the place they catch their prey.  As well as doing the hunting the lioness will give birth every two years. Gestation is just 4 months and the cub will weigh about 3lbs. The cubs pretend to stalk at 3 months, they hunt at 12 months, however if good is scarce they are the last to eat. Lions dominate cheetahs and leopards and will steal their kills and kill their cubs.

The safari guides are so good and despite no gps or trackers in 62,000 acres Leon knew just where they were going to go and manoeuvred us appropriately. We watched the 2 lionesses actively hunting whilst the cubs were jumping on dad’s back until he had enough, stood up and walked away from them!  Suddenly the lionesses homed in on two Warthogs – pumbaas- as the guide calls them. The pumbaas were unaware they were being eyed up as a tasty treat.  As the girls got closer to their prey the pumbaas were still looking the wrong way. Hearts in our mouths we watched the girls pounce but their hearts weren’t in it and the pumbaas suddenly aware of the predators ran for their lives into the nearby thickets and disappeared!!  (We were all on the side of the pumbaas). The hunters gave up and began to stalk in our direction. The females run quickly but in short bursts and need to be close to their prey before starting their attack. 

They barely glance at the safari cars as they don’t view them as a threat and we were all asked not to be loud, hang out of the sides or call to them.

All eyes were then on the male who, being fed up with looking after the kids, slowly got up, yawned and began to saunter in our direction. He was just a short distance away and then he was there in front of us throwing us a glance as he walked by.

It’s remarkable how calm you feel when this fierce King of the Jungle walks by in touching distance, (no Sue, this is not the moment to hug the lion! ).One false move and we would have been no match for him. Our guide has a loaded gun, bullet not tranquilliser dart, but that furry beauty would have made mincemeat of us all before he would have had time to aim.

Then there were the cubs who were still a distance away. A little time later they made their way up to us but although very bouncy and quite adorable they had no sense of direction and went the opposite way to mum and dad!  Next moment we heard a deep roar and some growling and dad was calling them to him. 

The whole session was one of the most spellbinding 30 minutes we’d ever spent.

After that, as we returned for breakfast we saw a dazzle of zebras, a journey of giraffes, a crash of rhinos and a rarely seen Aardwolf but did any of them compare to those lions? – not a chance!!