Safari - Day two (3rd instalment) or ...

... bottomless glass, bats and praying mantis!
No pictures but I've got to tell a story! Are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin ....

Arrived back at camp for a well deserved drink after our long day and wonderful cruise. Lovely, cool, long drinks with a twizzle stick. Jackie picks up her glass, gives it a quick twizzle and ... the bottom drops out of the glass. New drink, untouched, all over carpet on floor! Ooooops! Now Jackie's had some duff stuff in her time but this has got to take the prize for duffest of all. Just soooo glad it wasn't me 'cos I'm usually the other one that gets the duff stuff if Jackie doesn't - lol! We all examined the glass but it was a totally clean 'break' but it wasn't a break. It was just the bottom coming clean away. Had to be seen to be believed and I didn't get a photo! Matt took one but, as yet, he's not shared any of the ones he took :0( That was the first bit of trouble and from there it just got better!

Turning in for bed that evening and Jackie in bathroom, getting comfie when I heard her scream ..... "BAT!" Jackie in bathroom. Bathroom open to elements. Dark. Bats regularly flying around (and yes, room open so they flew in ... and then out) but this time bat managed to fly into bathroom, hence Jackie's scream. Quite what she thought I could do about it, with her in occupation and bats using sonar I had no idea. Told her to be brave! Now, not sure whether that was the first incident or the 2nd (think it first though) 'cos can't remember the order of events now and notebook doesn't make it clear either (yep, I had a notebook I was using as a diary but it didn't tend to get updated every day - unfortunately!) but ....

Jackie got into bed only to inform me there was 'something' in the netting! This 'something' was about an inch to an inch and a half long although Jackie will tell you it was about 3 times that size! I've still to get ready for bed at this stage 'cos me, I was chasing geckos to photograph (and anything else I could find to take photos of). Anyway, netting had an overlap and 'something' was caught in the middle of the overlap. Putting my 'brave head' on ('cos there was no way Jackie was going to even find one let alone put it on) I tried easing said 'something' out of netting. I certainly succeeded in easing it out ... the wrong way! Instead of it coming outside the netting it ended up on the bed side of it - with Jackie fast exiting on the opposite side of the bed! Now I became as big a wuss as she is 'cos the only way that this 'something' was coming out was somebody physically climbing in to get it and it was going higher and higher up the netting until it was out of reach of either of us.

I now need to explain - when we arrived at Beho Beho and were shown our room we were given a few rules. One was that nobody, but nobody, walked around camp after 6:30pm without a guide because of the strong possibility of meeting a wild animal in the dark (in daylight, if we came upon one we were told to stand still and slowly back away). We were also shown a small tub that held insect repellant, insect killer spray, a wind up torch and an airhorn. The latter only to be used in dire emergency ie: if a wild animal should find it's way into our room (remember, it's open verandah and, although protected by electrified wire, it's always a possibility)

Anyway,at this point we decided we needed help. We had no idea what 'something' was or what it could do to us. We knew we'd been the first to leave for our banda and that nobody else ie: Matt & Anie had yet left the main building (we'd have heard them pass if they had). We decided that, although we might consider this 'something' to be an emergency it was unlikely that Tam and Sasha (the managers) or Matt and Anie would agree with us so, using the airhorn was NOT an option, no matter how tempted we were. Thinking heads on we decided we'd try to attract the attention of those left in the main building .... which was some distance away. While I kept an eye on 'something' Jackie opened banda door and called for help. I would say shouted but her call - I find it difficult to even call it that - was so pathetic I don't think anybody passing at the top of our path would have heard! Then she comes up with the idea of morse code ... with the torch ... and starts shining torch out of the door, switching it on and off. I decide to help by calling louder than she did *LOL* Next thing, we jump out of our skins as body suddenly appears halfway down our path. As it comes closer we see it's a Masai! Now reason we were given not to use airhorn, except in dire emergency is 'cos nice Masai (night security) get upset if horn used in non-emergency so here's us calling for help and flashing torch hoping to get help from main building and what do we get? .... Masai ... and we didn't even use the airhorn!

Anyways, Masai comes in and we manage to get him to understand what the problem is. He takes one look at what I was pointing at, gives a grin, pulls back the netting, does a little jump, grabs 'something' and puts it outside. So that 'something' was obviously 'nothing' but stupid, gushing English women can't thank him enough, despite grin on his face saying just 'stupid!'. We decide not to mention said incident next day only to find out everybody knew about it by the time we saw them all! Obviously we'd amused Masai enough that it gave him a good story *LOL* The only thing we could come up with? Well, we didn't use the airhorn! ... and the 'something'? It was a praying mantis but not in a form I recognised, although we did have one that I did recognise on our last morning ...

The night finished well ... with thunder, lightening and torrential rain. So much so that we had quagmire's and a brilliant 4-wheel drive experience the following day!

Thanks for dropping by .....