Dann Viljoen Game Reserve

So, the other weekend we decided it was time to do something. Also, I hadn't really seen any animals so far (except for the guinea fowl which lives in the river bed behind our house and is a kind of African 'Perlhuhn') and we were too late for something really big so we decided on Daan Viljoen.
Dann Viljoen is a 39km2 Game Reserve west of Windhoek and since it doesn't have any predators you can actually walk around in it! (In Etosha you're not even allowed to open the car door....strictly speaking). SO that's what we did for our Sunday afternoon!

We drove out of the city. If you do that, pretty soon the only thing you'll discover are hills and a very thin vegetation of sturdy tress and bushes.

Driving through the gate, we had to follow the street up the to restaurant/office/camping site to pay our park fee. Also, since we were too many people we used two cars. I was in the first one ;)

Though I really hadn't had any problems with the extra bit of time. In the tree on the left you can see a really common nest type. The birds built little bowls which hang there, as far out on the branch as possible, to make nesting safer for them and their babies.

It was quite dark and huge clouds were looming on the horizon. Eventually, we also started to hear the thunder.

After 10 minutes or so we got a text from the other group, telling us that they had missed the right turn and were going to take a bit longer, so we decided we would start with a mini tour around the office/camping site. Right were the path started, a warthog family and some baboons had a loud and verbal discussion on who was supposed to stay on that certain patch of earth. The baboons won (poor Pumba).

Can you see the Baboon? And more, really dramatic clouds....

Footprints. Oh and yes, I was walking around in shorts. If you intent to give the tan a try and you are me, you need to make sacrifices (like being warm and comfortable....though it got warmer like half an hour later).

Finally, the other part of our group arrived. We got our maps...

...and started!

With my camera I somehow either end up behind or in front of people. Taking pictures in a group just somehow seems to be impossible.

Our reliable and obvious path-signs....(and I would lie if I said we didn't think about turning it around....just a bit....;P)

Somewhere on the way we decided that finally the time for proper pictures had arrived. So we left the others to walk ahead and started taking pictures. Here, with a tree.

But of course, there was more to take pictures of. Can you see them?!

But then again, this pond was asking for it ;)

In the middle of it all I started to have problems walking. Something sharp was poking into my feet. After removing my shoe for like ten times without finding anything inside, we finally found the thorn on the outside. It had pushed itself through my sole.....

Arriving at the waterhole.

More guinea fowls. This is were our trip was supposed to stop. But who would we have been if we would have actually followed what we were supposed to do. So instead, we went on and climbed one of the 'mountains'

Which I highly recommend!

My usual and necessary feet picture

Oh and when we came down (we used a different way down than up) we found this!

My flatmate in deep thoughts, trying to figure out what happened. Its leg was lying a couple of meters away in the grass.

More animals....

...and did you know they have ostriches here?! (Now you know)

Since it was already starting to get dark we didn't do the other walking safari but made one round with our car. And look what we saw!!

Definitely a Sunday afternoon well spent!