At last, some pictures!

Yes, I know you really only come here for the pictures, not the articles... and I don't blame you.

Mrs Blog has been going through the pictures, picking out the best ones, and we just took delivery of a stack/span/hobo of good pics from our friend Annelien, who accompanied us on our recent trip to Botswana and Zimbabwe.

Here's a selection, in no particular order...

(There's even a naked one, which should keep the anonymous commentators happy).

We came across this mean and nasty old lady not far from the Pandamatenga border crossing, from Botswana to Zimbabwe, on our way out of Hwange National Park after taking part in the 24-hour game census in the park - a highlight of our safari calendar. This lioness was in the Matetsi Safari area, which features in my book, SAFARI.

Bagged these elephants at Chingahobe Dam, which was where we and our South African friends spent the aforementioned 24 hours counting animals. This year's count was a big improvement on last year's. It couldn't have been any worse, because it poured with rain for the whole census period last year and we saw nothing.

Incidentally, in the acknowledgements section of SAFARI, I mention that a rhino was shot by poachers during the game census,while I was busy writing SAFARI. This is where it happened, at Chingahobe. Apparently the people counting that year were close enough to hear the poachers chopping the horn off. Scary stuff.

Annelien took this most excellent picture of a lioness walking past Broomas, our trusty 300Tdi Land Rover Defender, at the Khwai Community Development conservancy in the Okavango Delta.

She also caught me in the shower at Khwai, four-handed. You can never have too many hands in a bush shower, I always say. (Oh dear, that didn't come out right, did it?).

And as the sun sets slowly over Robins Camp, Hwange National Park, we say night night to Broomas the ultimate off-road adventure vehicle. (Actually, that may be a sunrise picture. Whatever).