Once again, an early start as we want to get to the game park as quickly as possible. We are up, pack up our stuff, have breakfast and are off before 8 AM. We drive all morning at get to the entrance to the game park at noon. After paying all the various fees (which are different for locals and foreigners) for things such as each person, the truck, camping and our cameras, we go to the hotel to set up.
We set up our campsite on a small hill overlooking a water hole and the forest below us. As we prepare lunch, we can see various animals and birds, including our first elephants of the trip. After we had lunch (which our cook group prepared), we relaxed for the rest of the afternoon.
At 3:30 PM we all gathered for our game walk in the park. many game parks these days do not allow walking through the parks, so this is a great opportunity. We take a 2 hour walk through the park, walking down the slope to the plains below. We walk through the bush, often where there was no trail, other than the animals footprints - especially impressive were the elephant footprints.
At first we saw a few deer, then as we got further in, we starting to see elephants. We would walk around them trying to get the best view. We had a great sight of one of the large male elephants feeding from the tree. He would lift his head up, and then stretch his trunk up to grab and the leaves and stuff them in his mouth. He repeated this a number of times, and then headed off. We wandered up to where he was feeding, and saw the footprints that he had left has he walked away across the small stream. He had slid a small way down the slope to the stream and then left very deep prints in the deep mud on the other side.
We wandered through the tall grass, getting sights of elephants all along the way. As we started to head up towards the plateau, we once again saw some deer. They would eye us, and if we got too close, they would bound away. As we climbed to the top of the plateau, we enjoyed the view over the plains as the sun was setting. Once we got to the top, we saw a troop of baboons. The were fascinating to watch for a while. In many ways, they are quite human.
We then walked back to the campsite, with the setting sun forming a large orange ball on our left. We got back to the campsite, and then we set up our tent (overlooking the plains and water hole below) and did our laundry. They have water here, so we wanted to take advantage of that. Following a quick shower, we had a dinner prepared by the restaurant at the national park. It was quite good (and very reasonable). After dinner, Lars worked on the computer and we went to bed early as we have to be up early for another game walk through the park. Following that, we hope to make it across the Togo border.