DAY Nine – October 25

A long drive to Lobo but with far fewer cars, a better road and lots to see along the way… Including lots of lovely elephants. Even in the more barren looking areas with small trees that seemed to be struggling at the end of the rainy season, it seemed there were loads of animals to see of every variety scattered evenly along the way.  Zebra, wildebeest, hartebeest, giraffe, buffalo, Gazelles, even lion and eland.

elephant-baby-and-siblingsDeparting Seronera, we saw more lions and a lovely sighting of a cheetah in the grass. That makes the 10th we’ve seen on this trip so far!!  Also, a wonderful family of elephants including a tiny baby, who was being looked after by his 2 slightly older siblings.  They spent time playing and frolicking in our humbled presence.  Entering Lobo, we had the great honor of seeing a family of happy elephants who seemed to be really enjoying their new little one with everyone seeming to look out for the darling kiddo along the way.

The lodge is remote and very friendly and with lovely food…but every lodge provided us exquisite food at all meals….that’s why I’m now trying to take off the 10 pounds I panimals-as-mirror-sessionut on. The class tonight was going to be about animals as our mirrors and seeing which animal we were drawn to on the Safari. For instance, Sandy was drawn to the elephant, Emmy to the lion, Gennifer to the lioness, Peggy to the zebra, Semele to the warthog, and Lawrence to the eagle. We were to talk about the personality aspects of the animal we were drawn to and to discover what aspect of their personality was a reflection of us. We would be able to see the aspects of ourselves that we enjoy and then the aspects of ourselves that perhaps need a bit more nurturing. So it was a very lovely evening allowing the animals to teach us about ourselves and hopefully see the beauty in ourselves and each other.

Sandy had this to say about the evening, and later in the blog we will add what others had to say:

Carol taught a session before dinner and we all named an animal we were drawn to, said what we liked about that animal as a way to better see aspects of ourselves.  It’s a beautiful insight we all seemed to get a good glimpse into.  I chose the elephant, as that is a being so close to my heart. She resides as my heart-chakra animal in my meditations and walks paths with me in such meditative states.  Others chose the warthog, zebra, tawney eagle and lion and lioness.  We were asked to describe what we liked about that animal, what drew us to that form and in doing so we were describing a good bit about our own selves mirrored in the animals.  It’s a beautiful perspective, and one I hope to spend time journaling about in the future letting whatever animal be the topic on any given day to show me parts of my life to pay attention to.