Two Geckos on a Road Trip – Day 6 – Augrabies

It rained in the night. But not a lot. The Earl and I had left our camp chairs at Gecko 109’s site but they were dry when Alec brought them over at 07:00. It was overcast but still very warm at that hour.

Once everyone was up, showered and dressed we had an ‘Early’ breakfast just after nine. The Earl whipped up scrambled eggs with feta, bell peppers, mushrooms, bacon and tomato. Cathy brought her four slice toaster so there was no waiting for the pop up.

After breakfast we went to the bird hide. There was a little activity there but we saw a lot more on the lawns and in the trees outside the hide.

Cape Robin-chat at our campsite

Reed Warbler from the hide

Trying to hide

Male Red Bishop

Posing nicely

Karoo Thrush in the distance

House Sparrow

Karoo Thrush with Bulbul and sparrow

According to my bird app the brown-hooded kingfisher is not supposed to be here – seems he has not read the bird book! The starling and thrush are also surprised to see him

Brown-hooded Kingfisher

Karoo Thrush

Crested Barbet

Back at camp we found a ground squirrel!

At 15h00 we went for a drive in the game viewing area. We only spotted ground squirrels, hyraxes, vervet monkeys, springbok and birds. But that was not the point of the drive. It was for the colours of the Augrabies, the rocks and canyon. We stopped at a few viewpoints and just drank in the sheer, stark beauty of the place.

Driving through a puddle

Typical Augrabies Scene

Three-banded plover

Three-banded plovers at all the puddles

Vervet Monkeys were all over the place

Baby Vervet loves the Duivel Doring (devil thorn) flowers

The canyon from a view point

Another View

Me

Rocks and more rocks

The Earl, Cathy and Alec

Oh those colours!

They were so close but took off when they saw us – Our national animal The Springbok or Rugby Bucks as my grandkids used to call them!

The End of our Drive

Back at camp The Earl prepared a lovely lamb curry. We had originally intended to braai but rain was predicted so we planned accordingly. Ha – a drip and a drop heralded a perfect evening – so braai it will be tomorrow.

Sunset over Gecko 109

Waiting for the curry to cook

After dinner, I surprised everyone with a Magnum each. Earlier in the afternoon, I had walked to the camp shop and bought them while the others were napping or swimming in the pool. They were just the thing to cool the taste buds after a good curry!