Hotazel, 16 Jun 2006
If you have read my ‘About me’ page you will know that one of my maxims is ‘make the most of being where you are as you may never be back’, so since I am now based in the Northern Cape for a while I have already started that ball rolling and spent a weekend in each of the Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park and the Augrabies Falls National Park. I have been to the Kgalagadi before, in 1983, when it was known as Kalahari Gemsbok National Park, and 2000 just months after the Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park was established. This was in the days before digital cameras, so in the spirit of my other maxim ‘the best photo is the next one’ I just had to see what I could do with my now well-travelled Canon 20D.
It is a fairly easy drive of just over 300 km from my field camp near Hotazel, much of it on gravel roads. The closer one gets to the Kgalagadi TP the more and more sand dunes one sees. You arrive in the park at Twee Rivieren Camp (‘two rivers’ in Afrikaans) at the confluence of the Auob and Nossob Rivers, and although these flow only once a century, the dry river beds do hide permanent sub-surface water, which supports tree growth, mainly camelthorns. A map of the park roads looks like an inverted double-barred ‘A’ with the western leg along the Auob River ending at Mata Mata Camp on the border with Namibia and the eastern leg running along the Nossob River, which is the border with Botswana, to the point where the Nossob also crosses the South Africa-Namibia border. The bars of the ‘A’ are roads through the dunes that link the two rivers, a longer northern one and a shorter southern one. So popular drives are the circular routes from Twee Rivieren up one of the rivers, across the dunes on one of the links, and back via the other river. Along both rivers there are many boreholes with wind pumps supplying water to dams for the animals to drink.
As I had almost two full days in the park (leaving mid-afternoon on the second day) I opted for one day driving to north of Nossob Camp on the Nossob River and back, and the other doing the longer circular route via the dunes. Of course you must stop at all the waterholes as this is where most of the action is likely to be.
On the bird front this a good venue for raptors and I was not disappointed, getting good photos of Red-necked Falcon (lifer – on a short late afternoon drive just after my arrival), Pygmy Falcon, Lanner Falcon, Brown Snake Eagle, Bateleur, Greater Kestrel, Pale Chanting Goshawk, White-backed Vulture and Jackal Buzzard.
You are unlikely to leave the park without seeing Common Ostrich. Others that posed nicely were Sociable Weaver, Southern Fiscal, Capped Wheatear and Chat Flycatcher.
Small mammals abound and there were many sightings of Cape Ground Squirrel, Yellow Mongoose, Common Slender Mongoose, the endearing Meerkat and the really cute Brant’s Whistling Rat.
Of the larger mammals the most commonly seen were Blue Wildebeest, Gemsbok, Red Hartebeest, Springbok and Black-backed Jackal. Not far from Twee Rivieren on that first late afternoon drive I encountered a pride of lions and I’m guessing that this may well be one of the best lion photos I will ever take.
The park is known for its cheetah population and although I missed out this time, on my first visit in 1983 I did see something that I have never seen since despite many trips into the Kruger Park, a female cheetah with five cubs.
It was dead-heat for best sighting of the trip between a pair of Bat-eared Fox and an African Wildcat with two kittens. Perhaps the best photo of the trip was a Black-backed Jackal.
