#Wednesday Walk - Enjoying Herds of Impala on Our Way to a Hiking Trail

This post is for the #wednesdaywalk challenge and the #makemesmile challenge collaboration. This collaboration initially took place once a month, but due to its popularity, @tattoodjay (of the #wednesdaywalk) and @elizacheng (of #makemesmile) decided to make it a weekly thing.

If you want to know more about the rules, visit this week's post by @tattoodjay where you will find all the rules at the bottom of his post after you've enjoyed his beautiful photos from his walk.

Today I would like to share some images of some wildlife scenes we enjoyed while leaving the campsite where we spent the weekend in the Cumberland Nature Reserve.

We were actually on our way to a hiking trail where we wanted to go and explore, but the journey to get there started with excitement even before we really left the camp.

We were still inside the camp area when we noticed this herd of impala. They were standing in the opposite direction to where we wanted to go, but I first turned toward them to have a better look at them.

As you can see in the photo above, the one was standing apart from the herd. Clearly feeling unrestful, he kept making loud "barking" sounds to warn the rest of the little herd about something.

As I brought the vehicle to a standstill, he looked at us for a short moment to see what we were up to...

But, as soon as he saw we remained stationary, he focused on what he considered to be a threat again.

The rest of the herd also started getting restless and at times, started looking toward us, and then in the direction of where the other one was making his barking sounds.

Although we couldn't see anything from where we were, the keeping watch remained focused on a very specific spot.

I decided to let the car slowly run back (downhill) in the direction of where the impala was looking to see if we could figure out what was upsetting him so much...

And there it was...somehow, a bright yellow plastic bag made its way into the grass. It got stuck in the grass, but as there was a light breeze in the air, it moved in the wind...

Doing some online research about this behavior once we got home, I found this is typical behavior when the leader feels there is a threat to the herd, making these loud, barking noises to warn the herd about danger. You can find more interesting facts about the Impala in the same post.

After this experience, I turned the car around and we left the camp, going toward the hiking trail at the Riet Spruit. For the next photo, I just stopped the car and took this photo from behind the steering wheel...lol.

But along the way, we found more impala. This one was strolling around on its own, but still not far from the herd.

Then we had some "pedestrians" crossing the road.

Until the whole herd crossed the road and was comfortable and relaxed in the taller grass.

In my last photo for today, you can see a typical scene as we saw it on our way to the Riet Spruit.

And that's it for today, folks. I'll cover some scenes at the Riet Spruit and the hiking trail along the river in some upcoming posts.

Thank you for reading my post! I do appreciate it!