After Sami's newfound love for animal encounters, we signed up for a morning cheetah walk for today. We got there at 7:15 and met the staff and the other walkers over tea. We then met with Zulu and Duma, two 20-month old cheetah brothers. The guide put the harness on them, gave us the safety instructions and then we were off for the walk.
The cheetahs were very gentle, and enjoyed being petted and purred VERY loudly. In order to avoid the cheetahs from feeling constrained and running away, we had to ensure that they never felt any tugging from the leash. So it was very important that we always kept up with the cheetahs, which proved difficult when Sami's cheetah began to sprint down the path to catch up with the other one! Also, it is very difficult to "lead" a cheetah. Even the rangers are unable to direct a cheetah in one direction or another, you must simply walk alongside them and go wherever they want to go.
After our morning cheetah encounter, we headed back to the reception where another ranger brought in a baby leopard! It is EXTREMELY rare to see leopards, let alone get to touch them, so we excitedly ran up and petted it. In contrast to lions and cheetahs, leopards are very unpredictable, and where is is safe to let lion or cheetah cubs chew on your fingers, a leopard cub may decide to keep them as a souvenir (the ranger informed us of this fact while the leopard had Sami's fingers in his mouth)!
We were then taken on a tour inside enclosures where we had a chance to see a number of other lesser known cats up close, including the caracal, the african wild cat (from which all feral and domesticated house cats derive from), and also the beautiful spotted serval.
Finally, we were taken to the cheetah cub enclosure where we got to play with two 9-month old cheetahs!
On our way our we visited some of the rare birds they had in the garden.
After Sami managed to safely stick his hands in the mouths of lions, cheetahs, and leopards, it was a Maribou Stork that finally decided that Sami's fingers were lunch!
We also spent some time with the park's conniving little meerkat!
After a fun animal encounters, we headed back to Wild Spirit Lodge and took a magical hike through its forest all the way to a private waterfall pouring into a series of rock pools.
We also took some time to explore the beautiful Wild Spirit grounds.
The sweet owner of Wild Spirit, Jen, convinced us to join her and the other guests to have dinner at a diwali celebration happening in downtown Plettenberg. It was quite a random event, apparently with one family of Indians hosting hundreds of white hippies for a diwali party at their tiny Indian restaurant! There were lots of hand drums to play on, a meditation guide, belly-dancing, and even an impromptu fire show. Highly eclectic, and very entertaining! Certainly not what we expected to do in this small town in South Africa!
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