Today was our last full day in the Park, so even though we had originally planned to make it a half day and spend some time sound Ngwenya, we still managed to wake up at 5am once again and get a nice early start through the gates. Before leaving we quickly popped down to the lookout hide by the chalet and sat there watching a lone rhino slowly make it's way down to the river and have a drink. Was lovely to just sit there and watch him stroll down without a care in the world. We then hopped in the car and made our way towards Crocodile Bridge Gate. We decided to try the longer dirt road instead the main tarred road up to Lower Sabie, but that landed up being a rather uneventful journey, with very few animals on the way, but plenty of bird life. As well as some meerkat in the road alongside the car which we hadn't yet seen. We stopped a couple coming the other way who mentioned they had seen lion a few hours earlier in the day but not a lot else along that dirt road. So we figured we'd make our way to where they had spotted them in the hope they might still be there or at least have a bit more luck on a different road.

We headed towards the lions and didn't see anything of particular interest on the way, and then spotted a few cars where the couple had described, and indeed the lions were still there, all lazing about in front of the bushes and trees a fair distance away, but in prefect view from the road. They clearly hadn't moved at all since this morning which was a bonus for us. While sitting there watching them, there was suddenly a bit of action when an impala came running up from behind us and did a panicked about-turn when it saw the lions ahead of if. It was too quick for the lions, but certainly woke them all up and put them on high alert. Soon after that they all gradually got up, gave us a stretch and then moved off to the back under the trees to enjoy the cooler shade. Once they'd all disappeared from sight we figured it was a good time to leave and headed up to Lower Sabie for lunch.

After lunch we drove up to Sunset Dam and stopped there a while, then continued around the Lower Sabie roads for a few more hours coming across many of the same and usual sightings, nothing we hadn't already seen. Then half way through the afternoon we decided to slowly start making our way back to the lodge to make the most of our time there. We thought we'd take a drive past where we had seen the lions earlier in the day, but were all rather doubtful we'd still see them there. No cars in sight as we approached the spot from earlier, however, dad manage to notice something in front of the bushes which turned out to be the same pride as earlier! What luck. Plus we were the first and only car there. Since we had plenty of time we thought we'd just sit there and watch them for a while. Just to the right of the lions were a small group of hornbills having a brilliant time playing in the sand having a dust bath. So between watching the lions just laze about, the little hornbills kept us entertained.

After a while of not much happening other than an ear flick or two, we were undecided whether or stay or go, when there appeared to be a bit of movement from one of them when she decided to stand up, give a good stretch and appear to have her eye on something in the distance. We could see a few rhino ahead of them, but knew they wouldn't be interested in them, when suddenly we spotted three giraffes quite a bit ahead of us - two amongst the trees and one in road. And that's when she set off, slowly making her way towards them, keeping her eyes on them all the time. By now we could feel our hearts beating faster with the excitement of what might happen next!

After watching her stalk these giraffes ahead of us for some distance, we realised we no longer had our advantage view in the front, we'd land up being at the back of the action, which was a bit annoying. Then it all changed - she had managed to get herself into a position to chase one of the smaller giraffes back from where she had come from, in our general direction. While this was all happening, the other two lions had both woken up and were standing alongside each other facing them, ready to attack. They had formed a triangle, with one at the back doing the chase and two in the front ready to intercept, with the giraffe in the middle, running for it's life! I guess at that point the giraffe realised it was blocked off and did an immediate left turn, towards us. Since we had been the last car at the back, no one was behind us, so dad was heading at full speed in reverse to keep up with the action, even veering offroad at one point. On seeing the giraffe turn and head towards us, he hit the brakes and the lot of us embraced waiting for this massive animal to hit the car. Somehow it missed, we have no idea how, but it managed to avoid the car. All we saw were it's legs and felt as if it was standing above the car, and then continued to run forwards amongst the other cars. The chasing lion continued to follow the giraffe, but had lost it's momentum, with the other two lions standing either side of our car. With the actual chase over, the lion seemed to push the giraffe off into the distance, almost as if to get rid of it, annoyed it had missed a possible tasty dinner. It was the most incredible thing to watch, and left us all slightly shaken but full of adrenaline! And lucky that we hadn't had to take the full impact of the giraffe hitting the car!

After such intense excitement, and now having run out of time in the Park, we had to mission back to the gate before closing time. Back at Crocodile Bridge Gate, we decided to enquire about an early morning game drive tomorrow morning, our last opportunity for a drive in the Park. You'd have thought we'd had had enough excitement for one holiday :) We landed up getting beck to Ngwenya much later than we had first planned, but after a day like we had, there weren't any regrets about that. Then this evening we had our usual braai and drinks outside on the patio, with us all repeating the events and trying to work out exactly what happened earlier in the day and try to piece it all together.