Wakkerstroom

 We arrived in Wakkerstroom mid-afternoon on 16th May. Seeing 17 distant Southern Bald Ibis along the way. Our campsite was in the centre of this small town, but actually quite nice, with our own private ablutions. However, night time temperatures were very low & we retired to bed early in the caravan.

The next day we awoke to freezing fog, but this didn't deter our bird guide Norman, who we had hired for the day. He proved to be a very nice guy & knowledgeable about the sites with the local species on. We spent the whole day driving slowly around a couple of circuits & saw the vast majority of our most wanted species.

On the 18th May we again picked up Norman from his smallholding & we drove straight to his best Ground Woodpecker location. We soon heard three birds calling on the hillside but they were distant & unfortunately remained so. We did obtain prolonged views though & thoroughly enjoyed the experience. This species seems to have got very scarce in recent years in the northern part of its range & is absent from many former haunts where it was regular.

We then dropped off Norman at his work at 9 am & visited a small wetland area which held around 20 African Snipe. 

Next we drove back to the African Rock Pipit site, which we had visited the previous day. After a while we heard a lone bird singing on the top of a distant ridge. 

We returned to camp for lunch & were entertained by a pair of Red-throated Wrynecks actually flying around our campsite. We watched them for quite sometime & obtained fantastic photos.

In late afternoon we briefly visited the Wakkerstroom Wetland Nature Reserve, which is on the edge of town. Our purpose was to photograph the Lesser Rush Warbler & after a struggle were obtained great views of one bird.

On 19th May Delana & I drove a loop on & around the Amersfoort Road. It was a nice sunny winters morning & we saw a good selection of the commoner species.However, we failed to find our targets: Blue Korhaan & Black-winged Plover. We returned to camp rather disappointed but in the evening enjoyed a good meal in the Wakkerstroom Hotel.

The next day we packed up camp & drove the 310 kms to Giant's Castle Reserve in the central Drakensberg.

To be completed.