Meerkats and Brown Hyenas! Oh my!

After a 6:30 wake up call, we are off to see the Meerkats.  Meerkats are in the mongoose family and reside in the Kalahari Desert.  Jack's Camp has a Meerkat tracker - this man literally stays with the Meerkats all day in order to know where they are located for the guests.  These creatures were hilarious - totally comfortable with us.  They look around the sky for potential predators - and search for the highest point from which to look.  

Well....in this case, the highest point was my dad....




We spent 2+ hours with them, and we easily could have spent more.  They had a litter of babies with them as well.

Here are 2 of the babies - crawling over my shoe as I take their photograph.....

After the meerkats, we go see a huge Baobab tree 




- with carvings in it from explorers in the 1800s.  

In the evening we go in search of the very rare brown hyena.  It's very seldom that people get to see one ... our guide however knew where there was a brown hyena den - so we head there at dusk when hyena pups would be coming out of their dens.  Almost immediately we see a little brown fluffy head pop up - and a few minutes later, another one.  They were adorable -  MUCH cuter than the adult version.

At dinner we meet the new arrivals - another British couple - but this time, they are younger and very friendly.  We have a fun dinner as the guides regale us with funny stories about past guests and animal incidents.  After dinner, we have a nightcap by the fire - or as they joke here "Bush TV".