Afternoon Drive

Okay, things are settling down just a touch with the afternoon drive.  We still saw a lot, but it wasn't all new and different this time!  I did see my new favorite heron on the way out, and managed to get a picture before it left. Turns out that purple herons are fairly shy.  Also getting a picture from a moving boat is a challenge!  But it turns out that my strategy of taking a zillion and hoping for the best did okay.

Purple Heron

Today was the day of the bee-eaters!  We saw several, including a pair of little bee-eaters.........

Little Bee-eater

 ..... that led us right to these carmine bee-eaters!  Who were in the same tree as........

Carmine Bee-eater

 ...... these quite fancy swallows!  It was a great spot with all of these gorgeous birds showing off, and we stayed there a while.

Lesser Striped Swallow

 Then we crossed a channel over what was to become our favorite bridge.  We saw so much!  There was this black crake.......

Black Crake 

 ....... and this pied kingfisher, several herons of various types, and......

Pied Kingfisher

 ..... this water monitor lizard!  It was hiding, one of the other guests saw it and pointed it out but it still took us ~quite~ some time to see it.

Water Monitor

 We drove around all over, and ran into a few vervet monkeys on the way.  Another guest gasped as he moved around, and said with a giggle, "It's male......"

Vervet Monkey

 We saw many many impala, I loved how elegant and somehow official these two look.

Impala

 And it's always nice when a hippo says hello!

Hippopotamus