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 p.63 #3 · African safari talk...recommendations? | |
Primus wrote:
Brett is spot on, as usual. Great advice.
I have done two trips with Pangolin, both to the Chobe and the Delta. They are very professional and their photo guides - usually there is always one on the boat - are superb. However, it is not a private safari and you will have a total of 8 people in the boat and 6 in the vehicle for game drives.
Expert Africa - I am doing a solo tour of Amboseli and the Mara in January for two weeks through them, but then I put it together and asked them to just do the logistics for me.
No experience with C4.
At the end of the day what matters is what kind of pictures you are able to take. At the same sighting you are much better off if you are alone in the vehicle. I cannot stress how important this is. It is expensive of course, around $400-500 per day, but you may stay for fewer days, and still get more out of the trip.
After years of traveling with world-renowned photographers - who have their own agendas, that's a separate story - I decided that the only way I am traveling on a safari is alone or with my wife, in a private vehicle, preferably in a conservancy.
The only caveat is that you obviously need to be experienced enough to make the most of your gear from a technical pov. The guides at these camps are so good that they will find the action and position the vehicle without your input. You just have to decide how long to stay at the sighting - although this may be governed by how popular it is and even in a conservancy you may be limited to just 15-20 mts at a time. Still, far, far better than the feeding frenzy of 25 or more cars all jostling for position to see the leopard or lion kill.
I've done many 8-10 day long safaris with famous photographers where you are in a vehicle with 2 other people - granted, you get a row all to yourself, but the position of the vehicle, the length you stay at the sighting, where to go are all decided by either the team leader -who wants the best photo for his own portfolio - or the alpha in the vehicle at the time. You spend $10K on such a trip and come back with good photos, yes, but you could do much better on your own, stay just 6 days and be your own boss. The first time I was able to do that it was an epiphany I had never experienced before.
We all have such limited time that it is, at least IMHO, even more important to utilize it to the maximum.
YOLO!
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I feel like our experiences have been nearly identical. I travelled on several photo tours with a renowned photographer/guide before venturing on my own private trips. There were some benefits with the tour. The pro I travelled with was very friendly and is an incredibly talented photographer and I did come away with tips and tricks that improved my images. Having someone in the vehicle who would snap you out of your tunnel vision and encourage you try different things with regards to composition was nice. Also, his experience did help with anticipating what the wildlife were about to do and this helped us be ready to capture the moment.
That said, even with like minded people in the vehicle, there are a lot of compromises. You're stuck in your row/seat and often can't quite get the angle you'd like. Decisions on what sighting to pursue or how long to stay at a scene are largely out of your hands as it's majority (or most obnoxious) rules. If you're not a birder and you have a few in the vehicle, you'll soon become frustrated with how much time you've spent stopped for that when you're still hoping for your first big cat.
My first fully private tour was a revelation. Just me and the driver/guide, free to do whatever we liked. You get to know each other well and I think they appreciate the simplicity of only one guest to manage. If you're a patient photographer, life is actually easier for them. They aren't racing around because you want to tick boxes. You're happy to put in the time for that great sighting which is typically their preference as well. The following two hunts I witnessed because in both cases, I spent half the day waiting for them. In that time vehicles came and went, snapping a shot of a lazy looking leopard or cheetah and moving on. When the action finally happened, I was alone in both cases. I'll only ever go on private tours from now on.
I watched this topi give birth while two cheetah brothers watched from a distance. Neither the mother nor its baby lived another hour. One brother took the mother down while the other grabbed the newborn. To top it all off, a lioness heard the commotion and stole the kill from both of them shortly after.
After resting all afternoon, this leopard emerged from a bush to snatch this young red lechwe from its mother in the nearby marsh. It was chaos as she splashed in the water, attempting to take the mother and then settling for the baby. She toyed with the baby in the tree for some time, trying to lure the mother out of the water. It was heartbreaking to listen to the lechwe's cries as the leopard batted it around in the tree.
I don't think I would have had either sighting if I were not on my own. Or, at the very least, I would have had to luck out much more.
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