There is an orphan family of cheetahs at the Bagatelle Kalahari Game Ranch, and one of the activities on offer is a chance to get close to them. They are a recognised site for cheetah conservation.

We drove soon after sunrise as far as we felt comfortable in our 4x4 towards Sossusvlei - thankfully there is a better adapted dune vehicle that takes you the final distance. This was the scene while we were waiting for it.

The climate became hotter around 900 years ago cutting them off the river, and eventually it became too hot for them even to decompose.

The famous Big Daddy dune!

Wisely, I didn't try to reach the top - taking photographs was more sensible!

Our hotel!

Our car!

We were very excited seeing zebras on the roadside... but this was well before we got to Etosha. By the end of the week, we'd probably seen hundreds!

Another incredible hotel setting.

On our way to the next hotel...

The waterhole was a short walk from our (very basic) room.

Impala

This was fascinating to watch... and very tense. For a couple of hours, the lions clearly wanted the elephants out of the way, but neither wanted a fight.

The wildebeest are coming!

These two lionesses eventually lay down just a few feet from our car window. I should probably have put it up sooner than I did.

The seriously endangered white rhino.

So we knew it was getting close to the time when we really had to be out of the park gates as it was starting to get dark, but looking up we saw the elephants coming!