Island Safari Lodge 13/9/11 & 14/9/11 (Day 9 & 10)

I have lost my blog posts for 13 and 14 somewhere in the ether which is annoying as my memory ain't that good. Anyway, here goes!
While Luis was braaiing last night (12/9) we had some surprise visitors:

This little mouse did not want to be upstaged:

This morning I wandered around the campsite happy snapping:

Eyeball to eyeball!

Hartlaub's Babbler

Bennett's Woodpecker

Good old Orange Breasted Bush Shrike
(pity about the twig)

In the afternoon (13/9) we went on a boat cruise. Our pilot, Cobra, is an extremely pleasant and knowledgeable young man who hails from Shakawe (our next stop).
A couple of our sightings/views:

Birds do it!

Spot the Fish Eagle

Luis successfully captured the essence of the setting sun in above shot. There is no streaking just an orange/red ball here one minute then gone the next. Even the moon is orange (harvest moon?)

A rare shot of Luis relaxing which probably explains why he looks so unimpressed.

This morning (14/9) we saw our first snake of the trip: a variegated grass snake about 2m long. He slithered into the dining area, heading for the storeroom. A man guided the magnificent creature back to the safety of the lush undergrowth with a long stocked feather duster.

Met a pilot, Dennis, who is on a work break for about 5 days. He also has a newly acquired iPad. He forgot to bring his charger so he borrowed ours. After a lovely cool, refreshing swim this afternoon, Luis and I were having a "private moment" in the Rad when a voice rang out at our door: "hello there". Luis did not miss a beat (no pun intended), merely said that Dennis should hold on a mo as we were getting changed. Dennis had chosen that moment to return the charger.
We leave for Shakawe tomorrow morning (15/9),not a moment to soon as a large crowd of attitudinal people arrived this afternoon.