Leopard - Pilanesberg National Park
If you ask any local or international visitor which animal they wish to see on safari I guarantee it will be a leopard! During our recent trip to the African Bush we were fortunate enough to spot not only 1 but 4 leopards!
PILANESBERG NATIONAL PARK
Pilanesberg National Park is situated in the North West Province of South Africa and is the 4th largest national park in South Africa. This Big 5 park is malaria free and is perched on the remains of an extinct volcano that erupted some 1,200 million years ago - amazing!
Tilodi dam
We entered the park via Manyane Gate as we were hoping to catch up with the male leopard called Clover whose territory includes Tilodi Dam. Unfortunately our only sighting of him was him sleeping behind some bushes so unfortunately no great photo opportunities of this cat this time round.
mankwe way
Our next location is always Mankwe Way as the rocky outcrops are the favourite habitat for leopards. After bumping along for a few kilometres the first outcrop of rocks came into view - it was now 7:30am. I always get goosebumps along this stretch of road as I spotted a male leopard in this very area during our previous trip. With the rocks on my right and sun behind me I slowly made my way down the gravel road at 15km/h making sure I scan every rock and tree. As I turned my attention back to the road to prepare for an upcoming ditch a slight movement on the left side of the road caught my attention. I could NOT believe it, just a few metres from our car a leopard was lying on it’s stomach - I would have missed it for sure had the ditch not forced me to turn my full attention to the road. I quickly stopped and switched the car’s engine off before slowly pointing the leopard out to my wife, both of us conscious to keep noise and movement to a minimum as we did not want to scare the leopard off. Now the big question was whether he was going to turn around and disappear into the thicket or cross the road ???
That moment!
To my relief (as I did not want to photograph through the dirty windscreen) this HUGE male leopard stood up and started crossing the road right in front of our car - we were the ONLY car at the sighting which made it even more special. I tried to calm down but to no avail as I found myself shaking with excitement and hardly breathing - this gift from nature is what dreams are made of!
The leopard was so close that I struggled to get him in full frame even @ 100mm!
As he headed off into the long grass on the other side of the road I took the opportunity to catch my breath… my wife and I just stared at each other trying to make sense of what we had just witnessed. I quickly positioned our car on the edge of the road so as not to block any cars if they arrived and waited for what seemed like forever for the leopard to re-appear on the rocks.
When I saw the flick of a tail through the grass I told my wife to get ready as he was about to climb onto the rocks - look at the size of that paw!
He paused briefly to look out over the plains before disappearing again behind some rocks. I was desperately searching for him I when spotted the perfect rock formation which would be a bucketlist image if he decided to climb over it! I mean what are the chances as these cats could take any path they like so I turned and joked with my wife that I could sense that he will climb down that perfect rock and pose for us … what do you think happened ?
It was over in a matter of seconds and my wife and I could not contain our excitement — magic!
Till next time…