Despite a good rest after brunch, Ian felt he didn't want to chance his stomach and risk another unpleasant "bush experience" so decided to stay behind for the afternoon drive. We've always said that if one of us was ill, the other would continue with activities as planned (unless of course it was serious) so I left him in the capable hands of Booboo and the other ladies in camp who were already fussing around him.
It's funny really, I always think I'm the chatty one but I was really surprised just how quiet the truck was without him - maybe he just gives me the confidence to natter.
We headed over to the fairly open area near the rocky outcrop in the hope the shy leopard might be around. We met another truck that had just had a real job coming down over the stones and he reported that the leopard was indeed up there but well hidden in a bush and not really photographable so we didn't bother.
Instead, to my delight, we found the pale golden male lion I'd christened Aslan again and because Ian wasn't with me I felt duty bound to take many, many images of him and to include them here - you have been warned. But of course he wasn't in an ideal position; shade, twigs, etc etc. and also it is so easy to forget his tail, which is almost as long as his body. These are just quick edits to try and share with you his sheer and utter magnificence.
I've deliberately left the annoying twig in on this one, as despite my best efforts Iphraim couldn't be persuaded to nip down and snap it off! Oh and I flipped it as I was fed up with Aslan looking the same way in all the pictures.
After a while we drove round to the other side but then I was shooting straight into the sun so although the diffused look is different I think I prefer the earlier ones and in any case there were still annoying branches.
It was fairly clear Aslan had absolutely no intention of moving in the short to medium term so we reluctantly dragged ourselves away.
Elsewhere up a tree, this squirrel was doing amazing semaphore with his tail.
A couple of randoms as we drove around.
Female Kudu, I love the way the light makes her ears glow and the fact that she can get her tongue up her nose like a giraffe can.
Speaking of giraffe.
It's amazing how these trees survive, they live half a year with the roots submerged in water and the other half in drought conditions.
Driving along a wide river bed gulley and suddenly this elephant crashed through the bushes.
His mate was on the top of the ridge and soon made its rather precarious way down.
I thought for a moment it would lose control and stumble into us.
Tawny Eagle
We then had what for many people would be the most fabulous sighting; a leopard up a tree with a kill - whereas I just wanted a leopard up a tree, draped languorously over a branch - in other words, forget the kill.
The leopard was a long way up in the tree and the sun rapidly setting so I've run them through my denoise programme but unfortunately they are not quality images.
We and another couple of trucks, including the Americans we'd shared the hide with - who still ignored me - watched for a long time whilst it tucked in.
At times pulling at the skin so hard he ended up with a mouthful of fur which he spat out in disgust.
After a while the other trucks left and it was just us, Daniel said the best hope of the leopard coming down was if it actually dropped the kill by mistake.
I've spliced two images together to try to give you an idea of just how tall this tree is. And can you imagine the amount of effort it took to drag the carcass up there.
I'm not entirely sure how anyone can get a tree out of focus but I seem to have managed it - maybe it's a Tolkien tree.
Eventually I decided we should give up although it was only 1745, as I was anxious to get back to camp to check on Ian and quite frankly we could have stayed all night and the wretched creature probably still wouldn't have come down.
