Out and about with the lions

Tonight, we went for a game drive where we saw the same bunch of lions from earlier in the day who had caught buffalo for breakfast.  At night, they were so much more active than during the day.  They were roaming around the kill and our spotter had the spot light on them the whole time.

All of the sudden, the group of young lions and their moms grouped together and booked it out of the area.  We heard a loud grunt off in the distance and our driver Patrick told us that the male lion was coming to feed and that the lioness was driving her cubs away to protect them from the male, who would kill them.  the other lionesses were out trying to prevent the male from coming over.  So we headed over to that action.

We found the male and drove out to see him with our spotlight on full beam.  Patrick shut off the car to observe the active in quiet.  It was terrific, and i tried to get some pictures.  the spotlight died suddenly though.  When Patrick tried to start the car again, we quickly realized that the battery was dead.  There we were, stuck in an open air jeep, surrounded by lions, not able to move, and without any light but our headlamps that we could shine into the grass only to see many eyes reflecting back at us.

After a while of fussing around, it became apparent that we would need to get out of the jeep and push it so that Patrick could kick start it.  It was definitely an apprehensive moment but all turned out well.  The lions kept about 30 feet away and we all quickly jumped back in the jeep never to turn off the engine again.