I played football last night, and consequently, I found myself absolutely broken today.
And yet I’ve still had to do a whole day of stuff.
Eina fok.
So here’s a Water Monitor from Kruger National Park.
He has nothing to do with my predicament today. But he will suffice in being a quota photo, allowing me to get on with going to bed.
We’ve been back from Kruger for almost two weeks, and I’m only just getting started on editing some photos. There a lot of them and it’s not going particularly well.
Here’s how far I’ve got so far:
This is the sunrise on our first morning game drive. Not even light enough to get any photos of anything else, and – being honest – a bread and butter shot because I was still a bit asleep.
But the sunrises and sunsets up North are pretty special, and this one was no exception.
Coming soon: some pictures of actual animals.
T&Cs apply.
Bit of catching up still to do after an amazing few days away.
Lots of great experiences. Lots of animals. Lots of birds. Lots of photos to share.
But…
A 20 hour day – which included a 4 o’clock start, a 4 hour game drive through Kruger Park, a 6 hour road drive through Mpumalanga and numerous encounters with its utterly mad drivers, and then a 2 hour flight back down to our little corner of Africa before we could get home – is still taking its toll.
A foolishly fast run this morning seemed like a good idea at the time, but probably wasn’t.
This hyena is me right now.
More tomorrow.
I’m out and about watching the UCL Final, and suddenly remembered that I hadn’t blogged.
Quick. Find something on your phone and stick it on the website.
There we go.
Done.
Have a great evening.
A couple of gold and black images from the last few days. As I was editing the spider, I was struck by the similarity in colour palette with a moon shot I got earlier in the week.
One was 3.84cm from the lens, the other 384,000km.
Otherwise: same.
The spider is one of the Golden Orb Spiders (Family Nephilidae). This one, measuring almost 100mm from one tip of leg to the other, with a body size of just over 25mm would be a female. You rarely see the males because they’re only about 5mm long. Well, it has been chilly lately, to be fair.
Unusually, however, was this one being tucked in the corner of the wall near the braai. . We usually see them on huge, strong webs in the back of the garden. I’ve never seen one out of the safety of its web before, and I’m not sure what has prompted this behaviour.
You should be aware that these spiders – though big and a bit scary looking (mainly thanks to the face of the tortured demon trying to escape from within its back) – are completely harmless.
The other photo? And (almost) full moon rising in behind a local Norfolk Island Pine (Araucaria heterophylla) tree taken from the front of the house on Tuesday evening.
You should also be aware that the moon and the tree are also both harmless.