• Safari

Continued from Page 37 phants, cape buffalo, zebra and all manner of birds from morning until night.

The number of sightings was a sign of things to come, because as one of the largest freshwater wetlands in southern Africa, this area of Botswana also proved to have the broadest selection of wildlife and some of the best viewing.

On our second day, we took a 90-minute ride in our game jeeps for a special treat to explore the flora and fauna of the delta’s wetlands from a different perspective. Sitting in the same types of dugouts used by natives for thousands of years to navigate the tributaries, our stickman steered our replica boats through shallow waters filled with water lilies and aquatic grasses. Tiny frogs, insects and colorful flowers showed us how the up-close aspects of safari adventures can be just as stunning as seeing the large mammals that attract most tourists.

As we gathered on our last morning in the bush, the guides were more animated than usual. During the night, they heard sounds of a battle between mammals in the bush. They rushed us into the jeeps and within a 15-minute drive we made one of the best discoveries of the trip.

A female leopard, hiding in the tall grasses between two dead trees lay guarding her overnight kill – an impala that was caught off guard as part of the cycle of life so natural in the wild.

In the early dawn light she quietly lay about four feet from her kill, where she stayed while we made photos for about 45 minutes. She never budged.

We were mesmerized, but as the skies lightened, we were off for the rest of our morning game drive. Back at the lodge, brunch and mid-afternoon tea followed before we began our late-afternoon and final scheduled game drive of our adventure.

Everyone was on high alert. About an hour into the trek, our group came upon several lions gathered in the bush feeding on the carcass of a cape buffalo. One lion – a male teen-aged cub – continued to feed as a female lioness kept watch over two other cubs playing nearby.

Stunned by the scene that continued although we were only 20 feet away, we made photos for nearly an hour, at one point tracking the mother and two of the cubs to a watering hole, then returning to the site of the kill.

Seeing a group of lions or a leopard with a kill is rare, but to see two in the same day was beyond amazing. It was indeed the highlight of the trip.

The next morning we drove back to the dirt airstrip for our final destination, two days in Victoria Falls on the border of Zimbabwe and Zambia. As the world’s largest waterfall, based on its width of 5,604 feet and height of 354 feet, Victoria Falls is twice the height and more than twice the width of Niagara Falls.

Created by the Zambezi River, the falls constantly produce a rising mist that can be seen for miles across the horizon. Rainbows provide perfect framing for photos and the spray can completely soak those who walk along the pathways and cliffs opposite the falls.

Helicopter tours are a main attraction and well worth the cost. The views from above, including a couple of swoops into the gorge put the massive wall of water into perspective. The calm-looking back-waters give way to an average flow of nearly 33,000 cubic feet per second.

As our incredible journey drew to a close, it was bittersweet. Our group of 14 travelers from across the US had developed a special bond over the past 16 days. We had shared pre-dawn game drives, evening explorations ending with sundowners in the bush or at our camps, hikes and discoveries that will remain indelibly imprinted in our memories.

Some of us are staying in touch with the possibility of shar- ing another international adventure through Overseas Adventure Travel and its sister company Grand Circle Travel.

As I spent several days culling through more than 35,000 images made with my Nikon and my iPhone, I relived this extraordinary journey, often pausing at a photograph to flash back to the moment and solidifying the memories.

However, all the photos in the world cannot truly recreate the experience of an elephant spreading its ears and trumpeting to protect her baby, the flush of birds rising above the horizon or the glimpse of the elusive painted dogs moving through the undergrowth.

Every safari is different, depending on the time of year you travel, the counties you visit and the people you travel with. It would be difficult to top this trip called “Ultimate Africa,” but chances are I will make at least one more journey to Africa to experience all the wonders it holds.