Ellies in the powder room, pups at the den: June safari report

The first of our Chobe-Zimanga specialist wildlife photography safaris took place between June 22 and July 2, 2016 and was a great success. From the moment we welcomed our six guests at Kasane airport in Botswana to our departure from Johannesburg, some 10 nights later and thousands of images richer, our photographers were treated to a wealth of brilliant opportunities that turned out to be even better than Steve and myself had expected (and our expectations were high since we’d previously experienced and selected the two brilliant photo locations we’d be visiting).

Elephant crossing the Chobe, photographed from our photo boat

From the start the light and weather was with us, both for the first section of the trip on the Chobe river and afterwards on the second leg in South Africa at Zimanga private game reserve – Africa’s first dedicated game reserve for photography. One of the reasons we chose these two particular destinations was the ability at both destinations to go out before sunrise and stay out well after sunset so we could squeeze every last drop of photography and great light from our sessions.

Yellowbilled stork carrying nesting material

Chobe is famous for its elephants and they certainly didn’t disappoint – we saw hundreds every day. On several occasions we were surrounded by them on the water as they crossed to Sedudu Island from Chobe National Park and back. Our boatman Kim was masterful in positioning our specially-adapted photo boat perfectly for the light, and in predicting when and where our subjects (birds or mammals) would go so we were always in ‘pole’ position.

Elephant bull playing in the Chobe

One of many highlights was seeing a group of elephant bulls one evening – burnished gold by the warm evening light – swimming towards us and playing in the water right in front of our photo boat. The splashing and trunk-clashing was thrilling to watch – consistently giving us plenty of action and brilliant behaviour shots. It was extremely special to share the watery element with them and experience their sheer enjoyment of the river. Often we would end our evenings at a spot on the bank our group dubbed ‘the powder room’ where breeding elephant herds regularly dusted themselves. The white sand on the river bank here became a rich, orange cream dimming to rosy pink when lit by the setting sun and looked great as we framed pictures while the elephants tossed it up in the air and over their heads and backs like talcum powder.

The ‘powder room’ – elephant dusting

There were very few sessions on the river when we didn’t photograph fish eagles, often at close quarters, and we photographed stunning African skimmers – another of the Chobe’s special birds on several occasions. Bird photo opportunities were brilliant on every photo-boat session including bee-eaters, tons of kingfishers, jacanas and a host of other photogenic and special waterbird species. We spent one morning at the nesting site of a huge colony of yellow-billed storks – great for flight shots as the huge, beautifully-coloured birds brought in fresh nesting material at first light. On the animal front we had frequent sightings and photo opps with Cape buffalo, big crocs, hippos, an assortment of antelope including a special session with sable, giraffes, lions on a kill (sadly not a photo opportunity as they chose to dine behind a thorn tree!), busy baboon troops, huge monitor lizards and even tiny tree squirrels posed perfectly for the cameras.

Nile crocodile hauled out on the bank

Cape buffalo with yellowbilled oxpeckers

Transferring to Zimanga we hit the ground running with two sessions at the den of the resident pack of wild dogs on the reserve. These animals are critically-endangered, endlessly fascinating and Africa’s second rarest apex predator after the Ethiopian wolf. Spending time at their den was a privilege – being able to photograph them as well, with such excellent low-level access to the pack, was unique. Our guests were treated to several opportunities with the pack members feeding and interacting with the alpha male and female’s 13 roly-poly puppies – a huge delight – although we were all unsure at the end who was more curious in who!

African wild dog feeding pups

Cheetah male at Zimanga

Another Zimanga ‘moment’ was photographing at the amazing lagoon hide which is set at eye level with a perfect backdrop for photography – thanks to award-winning Hungarian photographer Bence Mate who designed all the ‘kid in sweet-shop’ photography hides on the reserve. The stage was set when each of our two small groups entered the hide for a hectic afternoon’s waterbird photography with spoonbill, goliath heron, blackwinged stilt, egrets, kingfishers, fish eagles and many more stopping by to pose at close range. It’s pretty full-on in there and there was the chance for everyone to capture portrait and action shots to be proud of.

Goliath heron at the lagoon hide, Zimanga

African fish eagle at lagoon hide

Huge thanks must go to our guide at Zimanga, Hendri Venter, himself an award-winning wildlife photographer, who has vast experience photographing on the reserve and who was more than willing to share his insider tips and techniques with our guests. On game drives he drove us perfectly for shots of iconic African mammals – rhino, cheetah, wildebeest, zebra – against richly-backlit clouds of dust. The current drought in KwaZulu-Natal province where Zimanga is situated has at least this one good thing going for it, in that there was additional scope for us to capture these sort of classic dry season contre-jour shots on our visit. Thanks too to Hendri for collecting all the hats, lens-caps and bits and bobs we left behind in the hides in our excitement and for the welcome sundowner drinks when all the light was gone, over which we could relive and share the top moments from our photo sessions there.

Elephant bull mud bathing

There was never a dull moment and we were all quite tired by the end. We had just two overcast photo sessions the whole trip – one morning on the Chobe we woke to light cloud, but we weren’t complaining too much at missing the sweet light when the sky cleared later on and we had a joyous encounter with a huge elephant bull mud-bathing and wallowing with abandon right by us on the bank. He was flinging mud and flopping his huge body every which way and the low angle of the photo boat on the river below the bank made for awesome shots.

Blackwinged stilt at the lagoon hide

Dark-capped bulbul bathing

The second overcast session was the first of our visits to the wild dog den on Zimanga. Although this made action shots trickier to pull off, the soft, diffused light played into our hands for portraits, eradicating problematic and harsh shadows. The next day our morning session with the wild dogs was in perfect light so we couldn’t complain, especially as we hadn’t originally planned to do two sessions at the den. One of our two groups even had a ‘bonus’ encounter with the wild dogs on their final morning game drive when they stumbled across them on the move with the chance to photograph six of the pack (frontlit and into the light) playfighting, chasing about and patrolling the reserve on their rangy, endless legs.

Back-lit zebra, Zimanga

Blue waxbills at reflection hide, Zimanga

We could go on…suffice to say the gang filled all available storage space with the record number of shots taken by one guest almost hitting the 12,000 mark! Thanks again to the ground crew, guides and not least our enthusiastic group of guests who all played a big part in making the trip such a big success during photo-time and downtime. We’ve not only come away with great captures and memories, but new friends too.