August 20, 2009 | Africa
I enjoy watching animals, whether they are my cats (who are relatively goofy) or Susan’s Scottish Terriers, or the birds and squirrels and extremely fat chipmunk who hang out around our bird feeder in the back yard. I also enjoy watching wildcams. Although there are quite a few wildcams available on the internet, some of them are simply a stationary camera focused on a waterhole or eagles’ nest. My favorite wildcam quickly became National Geographic’s WildCam Africa, which featured Pete’s Pond , located on the Mashatu Game Reserve in Botswana. There was always something to see there, 24/7, and because there are no humans or vehicles to distract the animals, birds and reptiles, they interact with each other as they would anywhere else in the wild, offering a rare opportunity to see wild animals being themselves.
Also, there was Afke, the world’s best cam operator, who can always find something interesting to see, whether it’s a family of elephants dropping by with their babies to have a drink and play in the water, or wildebeest and zebra herds jockeying for position at their favorite drinking spot or, if there are no animals to watch at that moment, perhaps a close-up of ants and bees investigating a hibiscus blossom. If you would like to see what triggered my obsession and started us planning this trip to Africa, here is the link to the wildcam. (You’ll need Real Player.) Warning: this site is addictive. :>D
There is also a forum, where folks watching the activity at Pete’s Pond could talk about sightings, ask and answer questions, share information, have conversations with each other and with Afke, and even post screen captures of the animals, birds, and reptiles who visited the Pond, to save the sightings for others who were sleeping or at work. You can find the forum on Facebook.
I knew I had become obsessed when I began waking up at 4 o’clock in the morning, so I would have time to spend a few hours at the Pond before it was time to get ready for work. I had become a “Pondie.”
So when my daughter Susan and my son Doug mentioned that they had noticed my obsession (a very tactful way of putting it, I felt) and that they were thinking the three of us should visit Africa, I was astonished,. Although I had often thought what fun it would be to visit the Pond in person, the idea that I actually would do it had really never occurred to me. It seemed…and is!…so far away. But the more we talked about it, the more it seemed something we could do. The three of us have always enjoyed traveling together, and this sounded like a very exciting trip for all of us.
Next: Planning the trip
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