KEY POINTS:
The first rays of the red African sun were shining across the veldt, and we were watching a young jackal breakfasting on berries, when a distant roar broke the silence. "Hear that?" said Graeme Mann, our safari guide. "That's the new king of Kwandwe proclaiming the start of his reign. Let's see if we can track him down."
When we arrived a couple of days earlier at Kwandwe Private Game Reserve, in South Africa's Eastern Cape region, one of Graeme's first pieces of news was that there appeared to have been a change at the top of the local lion population.
A young newcomer, only four years old and not yet fully grown, had challenged the prime male and seemed to have won. "It's ridiculous. The older lion is much bigger and more experienced and should have easily been able to see off the challenge. But he looks to have had a real battering while the youngster seems just fine."
We had tried to find the young male the next evening. Graeme and his tracker Siya Njadayi had taken a rifle and gone into an area of scrub where they thought the lion was resting, while we waited in the safety of the safari vehicle and speculated on what we might do if they were eaten, but they had found no sign.
Now, with the new king publicly broadcasting his presence, tracking him should be easier. Sure enough, before long we found the young male and a flirtatious female consort, lying in an area of grassland, still roaring.
At one point the female joined in the roaring, then rose and strolled provocatively to a nearby bush which she marked with her urine. "She's a cheeky young thing," said Graham. "She's trying to claim this as her territory and it's right at the heart of the senior lioness's range. If it comes to a clash my money's on the old girl."
The male watched his girlfriend's performance with interest and after a time sauntered over to the bush she had marked and bared his enormous teeth.
It looked intimidating but Graeme explained the lion was actually using a gland at the back of his mouth to see what the urine would tell him about the female. "My guess is that he's out of luck and she's already pregnant to his predecessor."
Did that mean the male would kill the cubs when they were born? "He'll certainly try." And would he stay with this female knowing she was carrying another lion's offspring? "Oh," said Graeme cynically, "I think he's hanging with her hoping she'll make a kill so he can have a feed. His stomach looks pretty empty."
It was noticeable that the lioness seemed to be staring very hard at a white rhino with a small calf feeding in the valley below. "She's the sort of lioness who might try for a rhino calf," said Graeme. "She's very ambitious, not just socially but also in what she kills, so she might take that sort of risk.
"But," he added, "that isn't going to happen until this evening so we better move on and see what else we can find."
Kwandwe, which opened in 2001, is one of many private game reserves on what were previously farms.
During our drive down the coast from the city of Port Elizabeth we must have passed a dozen properties where the owners had given up the struggle of trying to make money out of dairy cows, sheep or ostriches, in the face of infertile soils and increasing droughts, and sought to restore things to the way they were before the first settlers arrived.
At Kwandwe, which runs alongside the Great Fish River, 15,800 hectares of adjoining farms were fenced, cleared of internal fences, pipes and buildings, then stocked with 7000 wild animals, including white and black rhino, lion, cheetah and leopard, elephant, giraffe and buffalo.
Seven years on, under the management of Conservation Corporation Africa, which operates around 20 lodges and game parks throughout Africa, the area has pretty much reverted to its natural state.
And in the middle of this wilderness CC Africa has built four magnificent lodges, each with their own manager, in between forays out to enjoy Africa's amazing wildlife.
We had barely gone through the gates when it became apparent we had left behind the modern veneer of towns and farms, shopping malls and petrol stations, and returned to a slightly scary Africa of olden times.
A warthog with two piglets at heel scuttled through the brush, tails flying in the air like tiny tufted aerials; the corkscrewed horns of a cluster of kudu stuck out from a shrub; a giraffe with an enormous blue tongue leaned down to snack on some leaves; zebra grazed on a patch of grass alongside the road; a red hartebeest, its coat glowing in the sun, watched warily as we passed; rare blue cranes danced together on the reserve's airstrip; there was even a brief guest appearance by a shy jackal which gave us a knowing look and then disappeared.
"So," said Graeme, after he had introduced himself as our guide for the next three days, "what would you like to see?"
The two male cheetahs swaggered like gunfighters as they sauntered across the plain in the misty dawn light. Their swollen bellies suggested they were returning home after a successful night on the town and they certainly looked pleased with themselves.
From time to time, when the rigours of a late night caught up with them, they would rest for a while under the shade of an acacia tree, licking their fur clean with long pink tongues, stretching tired muscles, rolling like contended cats or just snoozing.
Elephants are among the superstars of African wildlife so it's not surprising the big bull wasn't happy about the camera flashes of a bunch of safari paparazzi.
It was early morning and the light was still dim but we had been warned to turn our flashes off and as a result the 4.5 tonne giant decided to tolerate our presence. He gave us a long look, concluded we were not a problem, and carried on snacking despite the clicking shutters. But when another safari vehicle turned up a few minutes later and its passengers started started firing their flashes it was a different story.
The bull moved towards the intruders, grumpy demeanour and flapping ears signalling his displeasure, and when the flashes continued he made an impressive warning charge. The offending vehicle wisely retreated and the elephant resumed eating.
Incredibly, a few minutes later the vehicle returned and the occupants again fired off flashes at the elephant, who became seriously angry. This time his charge looked to be a bit more than a warning and the paparazzi backed off at high speed.
The mother lion was clearly in a bad mood as she walked past our safari vehicle, calling grumpily for her teenage children to hurry up, giving us worryingly dirty looks just for being there. She was close enough, and big enough, that I could easily have reached down and touched her, and I couldn't help reflecting that it would be very easy for her to stick a big paw into the vehicle and haul any one of us out.
"No, they don't ever do that," Graeme explained in response to a nervous inquiry. "As long as we're in the vehicle we are completely safe. Animals don't seem to recognise that there could be something edible inside. They just see the vehicle and that's that. Of course if you stand up, and they see a human shape, that all changes. So don't stand up."
In case anyone might still be worried, Graeme described an experiment he and some other rangers carried out a few years ago, parking alongside a clump of trees where some lions were sleeping and playing a tape recording of a warthog's squeal. "We were instantly surrounded by three lions looking for the warthog. They looked under the vehicle and all around it but it never occurred to them to look inside."
Meanwhile the cubs had finally arrived, one male and two females, sauntering insolently past us and following their mother into the bushes. We drove down to the spot where they had disappeared and instantly smelled something nasty. "Ah," said Graeme, "they've got a kill in there. They must have been down to the waterhole for a drink to help digest their food."
After some minutes bumping across the countryside we reached a small clearing where the mother lion lay yawning bad-temperedly. Not far away a jackal sat watchfully, hoping for a free feed, but keeping a wary eye out for the lions who would happily kill him if they got the chance.
Under a tree on the far side of the clearing we spied the remains of a zebra, reduced to little more than skin and bones after two or three days of feeding, with the three cubs gnawing what was left and occasionally taking time off for a bit of play-fighting.
As we watched, Graeme told us scary stories of accidentally blundering on to lions and having to face up to their charges, sometimes to within a couple of metres. "You have to stand firm," he said. "Whatever you do you mustn't run or the prey instinct will take over and they'll chase you."
White rhinos may be huge but they are possessed of an insatiable curiosity. So when a trio of them hid behind a bush Graeme turned off the engine off and waited. "They're very nosy," he said, "they won't be able to stop themselves from having a look at us."
Sure enough, first one massive horned nose poked round the edge of the bush, then a second and finally the much smaller head of a calf appeared. For a while they stood staring at their strange visitors, then slowly moved a bit closer, before finally deciding we weren't so interesting after all and shuffling off into the bushes.
I was reluctantly packing my suitcase ready to leave Melton Manor, the newest lodge at Kwandwe, when I sensed something staring at me.
Just outside the window of my suite a small face was peering interestedly inside. When I grabbed my camera and went to take a picture the monkey quickly moved off, but reappeared at the top of a nearby tree, standing upright and gazing in my direction.
Lodge manager Ross Buchanan was distinctly unenthusiastic. "That'll be a vervet monkey," he said. ``We don't want them around here. They can be a real pest.
"They may look sweet," he said, "but they're thinking about how to steal your wallet. If they ever get the idea that a lodge is a source of food we'll have endless trouble.'
During our three days at Kwandwe we saw almost everything on our original wishlists and quite a bit more besides.
The reserve has lots of birdlife, including the Kori bustard, said by some to be the largest bird actually able to fly, and lots of ostrich, the largest bird which can't fly.
Returning to the lodge one night we briefly saw a striped polecat (a relation of the skunk) and an African porcupine.
But one creature I had specially asked for, the aardvark, proved elusive. I was intrigued by this animal because of its strange name, peculiar appearance and high position on any alphabetical list.
We saw several termite mounds which aardvarks had dug into to reach the tasty larvae inside. We even heard a sad story from Graeme of an aardvark which was attacked by an inexperienced young lion and used its powerful claws to eviscerate its attacker. "In the morning we found the two lying dead side by side."
But there were no aardvarks ... until we returned after our final evening game drive and there, right outside the lodge entrance, were two of them ... well, pictures of them.
"Oh well," said Ross, "we like to give our guests whatever they want."
That's true, whether it's coffee and cookies to prepare for the daily morning game drive, a refreshing gin and tonic during the evening game drive, amazing meals, fine wines, the recipe for a particularly delicious salad, a hat for someone who's forgotten to bring one ... or an aardvark.
*Jim Eagles visited Kwandwe as guest of South African Tourism.
GETTING THERE
Qantas flies several times a week from Sydney to Johannesburg under a codeshare arrangement with South African Airways. See www.qantas.co.nz or www.flysaa.com.
KWANDWE
Find out about Kwandwe on www.kwandwereserve.co.za. Some lodges are sole-use while others have individual suites. Basic rates start at around $400 per person per night including accommodation, game drives, food and drinks, but there are frequent specials.
FURTHER INFORMATION
See the South African Tourism website www.southafrica.net.
