Ulusaba Game Drive – The Big Cat Show

Game Drive at Ulusaba offered us new experiences everyday. I believe this was also true even for the rangers and trackers. The amazing BIG CAT show was one that made us unforgettable.

Over the walkie talkie, Lawrence was told that there was a baby leopard around. After quite a difficult journey, ran on medium size trees and rugged land, we were all completely impressed by the engine of Land Rover, a little leopard was found.

It was such a close encounter, the leopard lay only somewhat like 5-6 feet apart from us. This was a completely unique experience to us. With spots all over the body, the leopard was such a beautiful creature. If you ever had a cat at home, you can image what we’ve seen in this morning’s leopard show.

This beautiful creature performed an unforgettable BIG CAT Show for us.

Unfortunately my mini camera had no video function!

It was actually a BIG CAT show. Cat walk, cleaning, scratching, typical lovely cat motions were all demonstrated. With his tongue cleaning his paws, then his face and his head; cleaning the tail, cleaning the hands, cleaning the rear legs – it was such a great leopard show. That was exactly what your cat does at home, but now by a big cat in the wild. It was just amazing! We were all extremely happy when saying goodbye to the lovely baby leopard.

Animal Emotions
Animals do have emotions. While Peter reported them being charged by a rhino, we were charged by an angry elephant in the same morning. Nobody knew what has pissed him off. Anyway, the elephant was coming towards us. Janet our tracker, with her natural instinct quickly drove away and the elephant was still after us for a certain distance. May yelled to wait while taking photo with Sean using the elephant as the backdrop, without knowing that her life being threatened. Janet said ‘you want a photo, but we want our lives’.

About elephants, I didn’t know that they were quite a destroyer in the jungle, until I saw the facts. They like pulling down trees and eat their leaves, bark and even the trunks. All the dead dry tree bodies on the floor were left over from their meals.

Bloody Kill
This was what we most wanted to see and most afraid of seeing. One morning, we were closed to a fresh kill, perhaps just two hours late. A cheetah lay proudly beyond his prey, probably a young impala. The cheetah seemed to be so full that he was unable or didn’t care to move.

See the cheetah and his prey on the tree?

Separately we saw a family of two lioness and three cubs eating the left over of their prey from yesterday. Pulling the internal organs out was really bloody and cruel. Next a leopard on the tree was enjoying his prey, a bit more fresh than the lions’. It demonstrated the natural rule of order. The dominator ate first, not until he finished, his subordinate didn’t had a chance. Once he moved away, the next quickly continued. And of course there was a hyena waiting apart to clear the left over.

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Ulusaba Private Game Reserve Encountered

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Ulusaba Private Game Reserve - South Africa
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Ulusaba Game Drive – African Big Fives

Game Drive at Ulusaba had a couple of safety rules to follow. One, keep quiet and still; two, stay with the group. In short, don’t leave the jeep and don’t do anything that will irritate the animals.

I was told that animals usually won’t attack anything that is bigger in size than them. So if we stay together – 11 people in a jeep – animals will view us as one single huge object (in terms of the animals’ eyesight) and will not attempt to attack. However if we leave the jeep and stand alone, we will become dangerous.

Before we depart for the first game drive, we were given a book by Ulusaba describing their property and the environment and the animals that we could expect to see. We all had a check list of the BIG Fives and see if we had the luck to see them all.

As we had game drives twice daily, different colleagues went on different routes and met different animals. Though game drive had no guarantee, every time we found something new. After all, when we cross checked our lists, we were all lucky enough to meet all the Big Fives, though on different days and different occasions.

As I said, my primitive camera on this trip didn’t produce good quality photos. I have therefore borrowed the Big Fives photos from Wiki. But I did meet them all.

African Big Fives
Lion, Leopard, Rhino, Elephant, Buffalo

Lion

Leopard

Elephant
Buffalo

Rhino

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Ulusaba Game Drive Experience

Breakfast and lunch usually served at Rock Lodge, with extremely fantastic views. Everyone were excited in seeing several elephants from apart. It was time to show off telescopes and binoculars. Those without one can only blame themselves of not well prepared.

Breakfast at Rock Lodge - very fantastic views

My room is at Safari Lodge which is quite nearby the training hall. All rooms at Ulusaba Game Reserve were WITHOUT air-conditioning. It was hot but a true African feel. All beds were covered with nets to protect us from mosquitoes.

While sleeping at night, we could hear animals roaring outside our room, but just couldn’t identify who they were. In the morning, we usually see groups of baboons playing at near distance. I had never stay close to animals that way!

We have two sessions of game drives each day – one in early morning and one in the afternoon after the training. The morning one was more comfortable in terms of temperature. The afternoon one was extremely hot. Anyway it was a new experience to see animals at their home, rather than at a zoo. It was a nine-seated open-top Land Rover with each row elevated to ensure everyone has a good view.

I am sitting at the tracker's seat

Each game drive was conducted by a ranger who is also the driver and a tracker who usually sit at the very front of the jeep whose job is to spot animals. Saly (the ranger) and Lawrence (the tracker) were our Ulusaba game drive guides.

Very unfortunately I brought with me a very primitive camera on this trip. My photos were not successful at all. However please bear with me. More interesting and exciting game drive experiences to come in my future posts.

I now become the ranger

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Ulusaba Private Game Reserve Encountered

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Anna's Amazing Journeys

Heading to Africa – Ulusaba Game Reserve

Ulusaba Game Reserve was in the middle of a jungle north of Johannesburg.

Departing from Hong Kong, it took us 13 hours to arrive into Johannesburg on direct flight. My company was taking us to another offsite, after to Dubai last year. You might wonder how luxury can a game reserve tour be. Well, first of all, we were connected to the site by a 90-minute domestic flight. I was told that if we didn’t take this expensive option, it might take over 6 hours of driving.

Heading to an African jungle, an additional preparation work was needed – medical advices. Prior to our departure, there had been discussions going over in our office of how to protect us from any possible diseases. On the safe side, I consulted a doctor and was advised to take a vaccination against Yellow Fever. It will go into effect after 10 days of vaccination and I had to carry with me some tablets to be taken while in Africa.

Life in Ulusaba (South Africa) was quite simple. There were mainly three things to do everyday:
· Game Drive – two times a day (morning/afternoon)
· Training – NLP
· Meeting and eating

Claiming to have been to South Africa, its better saying I have been to a jungle in South Africa. Actually Ulusaba Game Reserve was the only place I stayed through the rest of the week. Apart from there, we had a short 30-minute ride to visit a nearby village, and that was all.

I must say Ulusaba wasn’t as deluxe as Al Maha of last year, but it offered another kind of unique experience in my travel history. Have you ever experienced an elephant walk outside your training hall, drawing your attention away from the trainer? For me, yes, that was Ulusaba South Africa.

Upon our arrival, the NLP training was done immediately after a brief lunch at the Safari Lodge. Ulusaba had two groups of Lodges namely Safari Lodge and Rock Lodge, both among breathtaking landscapes and I shall go into details in my later posts.

Ulusaba Game Reserve South Africa

Anna's Amazing Journeys

The Legend of Al Maha

To wrap up my amazing journey to Dubai at the Al Maha Desert Resort, I would like to provide a little background about this award-winning hotel.

Well Al Maha is not only a hotel, but a conservative project aiming to protect Dubai’s last remaining wilderness area. Built in the style of an ancient Bedouin settlement, the neutral toned 'tents' shade individual suites of understated, modern luxury. Each private suite is furnished with original, unique and rare collections of regional artwork and antiques.

Staying within a green and verdant oasis amongst some of Arabia's most impressive dune and desert landscapes, Al Maha offers me personal and seductive experiences of the region's history and hospitality, in absolute comfort.

I really enjoy staying close with friendly however endangered animals like oryx and gaxelle. Actually my nature walk, desert dinning and field guides all contributed to an unforgettable unique and luxury travel experience.

The Emirates video below provides very comprehensive background information about how Al Maha was built in the middle a desert. Enjoy viewing.

More About Al Maha Desert Resort

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Desert Activities at Al Maha Resort

I was told that my company had to pay US$400 per person per night to cover our rooms and choice of two activities in the desert. The meeting package and desert dinner should be subjected to additional fee.

Actually our schedule only allowed one activity for each of us. Our company had short-listed Falconry, Sand Skiing and Nature Walk for us. The other activities included camel trekking, archery.....view the full list of Al Maha activities.

Though Al Maha was famous for its Timeless SPA treatments, we just didn’t have time to try it out.

Personally, I was afraid that Falconry could be quite bloody and Sand Skiing too exciting, so I have opted for a Nature Walk.

To avoid the sunny heat, we had to start at 6am. Only Sheila and I were in the group, accompanied by our Field Guide Gavin.

Gavin showed us how to spot the desert habitats by their unique footprints. Zigzags were snakes; 3x2 mini holes were beetles; holes like the size of our little finger were homes of spiders; gazelles footprints were bigger for the fore limbs and smaller for the rears; footprint shapes like dogs and cats were oryx and fox. Unfortunately, we didn’t see any of these creatures except oryx and gaxelle which could be seen almost anywhere within Al Maha. The Walk concluded in about an hour.

Gavin, our Field Guide took us to Nature Walk at dawn

After the morning activities, we all joined together for a Dubai city tour, followed by a 5-star cruise on a private boat. Our German guide told us that UAE is such a rich country that the locals don’t have to work. All those who have to work are from overseas. Due to the limited time we had, we were only able to visit one shopping arcade and a souk where my colleagues were madly shopping for carpets and shawls.

As for myself, I only wanted to buy the three little jars from my bath room and also the beautiful set of cutlery from the hotel restaurant. However both items were not for sale. That was the only complaint I had for Al Maha. After all, my only souvenir was the three post cards which were free from my tent (see below).

Al Maha Desert Resort Activities

Anna's Amazing Journeys

Explore Al Maha Facilities

Before I talk about the activities at Al Maha, let me talk about their room facilities first. It was a truly Arabic feel which made me feel like going back to the time of Aladdin and his Enchanted Lamp.

One morning, I woke up at 5.30am to do the Nature Walk. It was only 7pm when I came back. Rita, my roommate, was not in as she went to the Sand Dune Ride. So I had almost two hours private time in the tent. So I tried to make use of all the resources inside the room to enjoy a private session. The tent was connected to the outside pool and private little garden by 5 to 6 huge exits where I just walked in and out freely.

First I went on to the private pool for a swim and took photos for myself using the auto function of my camera. But I didn’t have a tripod. So I had to move stuff from inside the tent to support the camera. That was quite an exercise and kept me busy for a while.
The size of the pool was quite small like the size of a jacuzzi and the water temperature was quite high, so I gave up after a short while.


Lying on the chair in the balcony, I went on to do animal searching by using the telescope provided by Al Maha. In the surrounding desert area, there were many Oryx and Gazelle living harmoniously with human being. Actually we can see them everywhere even without a telescope. At the same time I was studying information about these friendly animals as I’ve borrowed some books from the lobby.

Next I used the drawing board and colour pencils to create a drawing of the surrounding environment. The desert landscape around Al Maha was actually very picturesque and that’s why we were given these drawing facilities. After my drawing session, the sun was up and it became very hot outdoor, so I moved indoor.

After swimming, it was time to explore the bathroom. It was huge, like the size of my home in Hong Kong. Al Maha bathroom was not only luxury, but unique. Things here were of Arabic design. Even the little jars containing shampoo and conditioner were of Aladdin style - very streamlined and elegant. I had never come across a bathroom that was so thoughtfully designed and decorated.

I brought some aromatic oil from Hong Kong to release my neck pain. It was a good time to have an aromatic bath as I really love the bathtub here. After all, Rita came back and we all went on to join the Dubai city tour.

This is one of the best designed bathroom I have experience!

To avoid walking under severe heat, we ordered a cart and someone came pick us up at our tent and send us to join the 4-wheel drive which in turn took us to join the coach for the Dubai city tour. If we were at the lobby, whoever available will be happy to drive us on a little cart to any destination within Al Maha.

Al Maha Desert Resort - Facilities

Anna's Amazing Journeys