Saturday, September 7, 2013

SEPTEMBER

September 9- 28:
Historical Clock Tower


Located in the middle of the V&A Waterfront in Cape Town.


Robben Island


Me taking my "Walk to Freedom", the same walk Nelson Mandela took.



Hartlaub's Gull


These birds frequent the V&A Waterfront in Cape Town.  There are a lot of restaurants located around the waterfront, so most of these gulls are habituated to the humans (mostly because people feed the birds).

Bontebuck



Elephants








Giraffes 


Lion

Vervets grooming

Some of the many mammals we saw.  We saw giraffes on a daily basis in Swaziland.  The lion was by far my favorite :)  We were fortunate to see several lions while we were at Kruger National Park!

Sunrise in Cape Town


I didn't get to see many sunrises on my trip to Africa :( But we did catch this one on the way to our hike of Table Mountain.  It was stunning, and well worth getting up early to conquer the mountain.


Table Mountain


Table Mountain was conquered (both ways)!  I am proud of accomplishing the hike.  The whole hike was spectacular!


Cape Bulbul


Caught in the middle of his song.  Just one of the many birds we saw in Cape Town.

Trip to Seal Island


One picture of hundreds I took of the seals.  We took a pit stop on our tour of the cape to visit the seals.










Bugs!!


A few cool creepy crawlers (okay, not all of them are creepy :)) discovered in Africa.

Probably the cutest rodent trapped on the trip!  He photographs well ;)

September 8:



Crickets

I saw so many cool crickets and grasshoppers while in Swaziland!  Here are two crickets hanging out.


Since I wasn't the best at even making updates when I got back, I'll go ahead and dedicate the whole month (or pretty much the whole month) of September to Africa. :)  

Here's for the first week of September:


September 1-7




African Penguins

I had the opportunity to go to Boulder Beach, home of the African Penguin.  It was so fun to see these birds hanging out on the beach!  Everyone loves penguins!  This was my favorite picture I captured of one of the penguins. 


Plants of Table Mountain

I'm not sure what this plant is, but it was beautiful.  All the plants in Cape Town and South Africa were pretty.  A lot of them were also extremely small.  (this was actually taken with my iPod!)



Lilac Breasted Roller!

This could be one of my favorite birds of South Africa.  You can find them everywhere around Kruger National Park.  And yes, I got extremely excited when I captured this shot!  Photographing birds has become something I really enjoy doing.


Weaver Bird and Nest

This was taken in Johannesburg while waiting for our ride to Swaziland.  It was so overwhelming all the birds we saw (and I'm sure you will get to see many of them :))  The nests of these weaver birds are so interesting!


HONEY BADGER!

Yep, we got to see a honey badger in the wild!  After lions, this carnivore was probably what I was most excited about seeing!  He was definitely at the top of my "must see" list.  You'll never know how excited I was to see this unless you were in the car with me!  


Wildebeest

This picture ranks in my top 5.  A lone wildebeest walking into the fog.  I like how it looks like a silhouette. 


Me... at the Cape of Good Hope!

I still can't believe I was here a few weeks ago.  South Africa is such a beautiful place,  I can't even believe I had the chance to go here and experience this!!