Hikers Wool Blog

One night after a hard and exciting day of walking and stalking in the African bush our safari group was sitting around the campfire recounting our adventures and the exotic (to us) animals and birds we had seen that day. We were toasting our weary but blister-free feet when our fearless leader said ..."come and look at this!"

Our camp was situated on a promontory with a dry sandy riverbed about 10 metres below us. Walking softly in the bright moonlight were a couple of elephants heading for the riverbed directly below us. In the distance we saw more elephants following. They arrived in two's and three's - large bull elephants, females, juveniles and babies - all coming to dig in the sand with their trunks to find the water which sat below the surface.

It was a magical sight, They hardly made a sound; just the odd grunt and the scraping of their trunks in the sand. They would find the water and drink, each making their own water hole. The babies though, probably still not quite sure what to do would try and muscle in on someone elses water and if it happened to be one of the bull elephant's the baby would get unceremoniously shoved away! Unperturbed it would just find another waterhole to share.

After about an hour and a half, their thirst quenched, the herd started to move off into the night - once again hardly making a sound. Just the soft pad of their feet and the rustle of the grasses that they moved through. We watched this scene for another three nights and to me it was one of the most memorable experiences of the safari. To be so close to these beautiful animals just going about part of their daily routine was something I'll never forget.