Last Full Day In Africa!

From August 24th

Today was our last full day in Africa.  We won’t actually fly out of Africa until 11:15 pm tomorrow night but today was our last day to take in some activities and have a more relaxing day if we chose to do that.  The most special thing that we were supposed to do today was go experience “Walking with the Lions”.  Even though it was supposed to be a relaxing day we still had to get up at 5:30 for breakfast so that we could leave in time for our early start with the lions.  That was alright by me because then it would leave us more time in our day once we got back for other activities.  

“Walking with the Lions” is at a wildlife conservancy about a hour away.  It is just as the name suggests, a walk with lions!  Ever since going last year it is something that I wished for my family to all experience together if we ever came to Africa together.  Now here we were and this year we had been told that you had to be 15 years old or older to be able to go.  My heart sank for Terrace at the beginning of the week when we heard this.  Last year the age was 13 so we are unsure why they made this change.  So we decided we would take Terrace along and be completely honest and see if they would let her go on the walk.  The leader of our group agreed that she could go but then when we got to the gate to get in with the lions they questioned us again and seemed very reluctant to let her in.  She was also acting a little nervous and they said that is a problem too.  So we explained what they had told us about letting her in and then they said to keep her in the group at all times and she could go.  We were so thankful that this work out for her!  Terrace was a little reluctant to want to go all along but as a dad I knew she would love it if she did it. Turns out this time I was right!  Has that ever happened before?  

They remind you that the lions are wild and that you need to follow all the rules carefully or you risk being attacked.  I have no doubt if they were not there you would be attacked.  Even though they seem to follow direction relatively well you can see at times they are just waiting for someone to make a mistake.  You cannot bend down for anything or or run or go off the trail, but believe it or not you are allowed to hold their tails.  Have you ever tried to hold your cats tail?  Usually cats don’t like people pulling on their tails!  

Today they had four lions for us to walk with.  You go out in a natural area with four staff and the lions for about a two hour walk.  They keep the lions attention with real meat for them to eat that they throw or put on a stick to keep the lions nearby.  We all walk with sticks since that is the tool they use to train them with so it makes us all appear to be trainers.  It is an amazing experience as you can see from the pictures.  They give everyone opportunity to walk holding their tails, plus have pictures taken at one area where they have the lions lay down and you sit behind them.  The staff do a fabulous job of giving everyone an opportunity to be with the lions, including lion bait Terrace!  They even will take your camera or cell phone and take a ton of pictures or video while you walk.  They love taking pictures.  We left there with well over 600 pictures that had been taken for the four of us.  Yes, a little excessive, but we will be able to pick a few we like and delete a bunch.  The girls loved the experience and it was even better this time for me than last year.  

After we returned to the lodge from the lions, with arms and legs intact, we had time to spend around Shikwaru relaxing and visiting with other team members.  There was still an opportunity to hunt today for those who wanted to.  Yesterday I had asked Jaelyn what she would want to do more, shoot an impala or see a giraffe.  She easily said see a giraffe!  Since we had not run into any yet on the trip we knew we wanted to make that a priority.  Of course I still really wanted her to have another chance at hunting and shooting an impala or blesbok but Jaelyn was tired of sitting in the blinds not doing much.  She felt better about spending some time around the lodge, swimming, playing catch and then going on a game drive to look for giraffe.  

The first time that we went to Entabeni we never saw elephants or giraffes.  Today there were several of the team who wanted to go back and see if we could see some more animals.  As a family we decided to join in and we were happy we did.  You all know I would have loved to go hunting one last time but it was worth it to see the girls when we found several giraffe as well as a herd of elephant.  It was awesome to see the look on Jaelyn’s face when she first saw the giraffe.  This has been her dream animal to see while in Africa and she thought it might slip away without happening.  I’m so happy it didn’t!  They girls both loved being able to watch these majestic animals in their natural habitat.  

After supper there was a special presentation of what is called “the pink jacket”.  It is awarded to whoever earns the most points after telling there stories about their hunting adventures.  Each hunter gets to tell their version of what happened and others who were with them or not can question the facts or add their two cents worth.  Lets be clear that the pink jacket isn’t usually something that you want to win!  It is usually because you have missed an animal or done something odd or funny on a hunt. 

It was looking like Jesse from Kentucky was a shoe in to win with his miss on a wildebeest earlier in the week.  We also gave him the gears because he is a police officer and should be able to shoot (he was hunting with a rifle).  But just when it looked like he was going to win I got to tell my story which really was very uneventful.  I really only hunted a few minutes.  I brought my bow along on the girls hunts but they were first up to shoot any impala that came in.  It was only when a kudu came in that my hunt began and Jaelyn stepped aside.  It was already decided that they would only be allowed to shoot blesbok or impala so everything went according to that plan.  But during the ceremony Terrace decided to put her two cents worth in and threw me under the bus.  She said piped up with, “dad lied and didn’t let Jaelyn shoot something before him” (this is all in good fun).  Well Jacques awards point however he feels led and this was all he needed to give me a bunch of points for misleading the staff that I wasn’t going to hunt and not putting my children first.  Suddenly I was in the lead and the pink jacket was mine.  Jesse you can thank Terrace for that one!  It was fun and I am so glad that both our girls and Crystelle could be together to hunt as a team.  We would have loved for Jaelyn to have a chance to shoot something too but it didn’t work out.  I’m glad she picked the elephants and giraffes to see…that was a dream come true for her!  We have great family memories together of Terrace’s first bow hunt, as well as all being together for when I shot my kudu…a dream come true for me.  God has truly blessed us!  I guess I can deal with wearing a pink jacket for a day in exchange for those memories…but  Terrace…watch out!  Dad may find some way to embarrass you as a little payback in the future!

I apologize for all the spelling and grammatical errors you have had to read through the last couple weeks.  Just didn’t have the energy to always proof read!