The best things come in threes – well that’s what they say. Except maybe leopards. Leopards are singletons, shy, solo, stand-offish, masters of mystery and stealth. You don’t spot one readily, pardon the pun, and getting the chance to photograph one well can be like gold dust. They’re extremely skilled at staying under the radar when they want to; helped by those stunning cryptic coats.

Even where there’s a high density of leopards in an area, and you’re with great guides and trackers so that the odds are balanced a little more in your favour, there’s still no guarantee these anti-social felines will grant you even the briefest glimpse into their secretive, solitary world.

And when you are lucky enough to see them it’s usually one lone cat – graceful, powerful, spellbinding and deliciously marked. But just the one. They’re leopards after all – not buses. (If you see more than one it’s probably a mother with a cub, a mating pair or rival males about to spar over territories and you should go buy a lottery ticket a soon as possible afterwards!)

But who needs to be greedy. One is usually more than enough with these special, highly-sought after creatures. And you’ll know you’ve found one because your nerves will tingle and you’ll hear your own breath coming quickly as you try hard to steady your trigger finger on your shutter release.

So you can imagine the heightened nervous tension and feverish excitement on the Pangolin photo-boat on our recent photographic safari on the Chobe river earlier this month, when at the close of a very productive session photographically we were treated to an awesome encounter and the most magical finale to our day. Not one perfectly posed leopard, but three, sitting out there on the near riverbank in plain view with six piercing eyes burning directly into our own.

A mother and her two almost fully-grown cubs had been down to the river to drink earlier (we think they had a kill somewhere near by) and were sitting there cool as you like – seemingly just waiting for our return. Laskey our boatmen expertly steadied the boat in the best position as soon as he’d measured the situation so we could photograph, and photograph, until the last light moved off, until the last fleck of white fur at the end of their tails had disappeared into the bush and until we couldn’t squeeze anything more from our cameras’ ISOs.

Out of the blue, not one, but three of the subjects that top most wildlife photographers’ wish lists on safari had deigned to grace us with their presence and were posing for our cameras just metres away. Even better they were only two minutes’ sail from our mooring for the night on the houseboat, meaning we could comfortably milk every drop of available light from the sighting before returning to clean up and down the triple G&Ts the staff had lined up for us to celebrate our feline threesome. Over dinner we all agreed it was pretty special and hard to believe what had just happened was for real. But Africa is like that sometimes…