We were on our way to go visit the meerkats one morning in the Makgadikgadi Pan area of the Kalahari Desert when we came across this baby steenbok blocking the road. From the photo, it’s tough to get a sense of scale, but this guy was tiny. Not much bigger than the average housecat. We couldn’t see the mother, but she was most likely hiding in the bushes somewhere nearby.

Looks like a bit of a domestic squabble here between these two lions. Laying in the grass behind them were six cubs – three belonging to this mating pair and three belonging to another mating pair in the pride.

Wildebeest don’t get much respect. In fact, their awkwardly gangly appearance has led to the description — made up of all the unwanted parts from all the other animals on the savannah. They also happen to be very tasty to top predators like lions. Usually they roam in large herds, but this guy was walking alone across the desert in the Central Kalahari — an area not particularly teaming with predators, but certainly not devoid of any either.

Every now and again, the meerkats would make a mad dash across the open sections of the salt pan. It was in these grassless areas that they were more susceptible to predators. I was never quite sure which direction they would run, but occasionally I guessed right and was able to get into position to get shots of them running toward camera.

Yes, this is, in fact, a wild animal. I know it looks like a common housecat but it is an African wild cat. And yes, it is about the same size as a domestic cat. I saw three of these guys in Botswana, always at night. This one was perched on top of a termite mound in the Okavango Delta.

It was getting very dark when we saw this leopard in the Okavango Delta of Botswana, but we were able to track her for a while and get the occasional good look. I liked when she paused in this almost circular clearing in the thick bush.

Impala were easily the most common animals that I saw in Botswana, and as such, they were often overllooked. That being said, they really are an elegant looking antelope. Usually they sat patiently while I took portraits of them looking at the camera, however, this one gave me a bit of an action shot when he ran across the savannah.

I know I’ve been posting a lot of backlit subjects from my Botswana trip, but the Kalahari Desert was the perfect place for these kind of shots with the sun on the horizon. Here’s one more, this time of a springbok just before sunset.

Lions sleep a lot, and this adult male was no exception as he plopped down in the grass to rest after filling up on an oryx kill. I was watching for a while, waiting for him to wake up when all of a sudden the cub appeared and crawled up onto the father’s belly. Dad seemed to enjoy the massage as the cub’s paws continued to dig into his fur.

The first time I went on safari back in 1999, I remember one of the highlights for me was seeing a giraffe running across the plains of the Serengeti. In Botswana, I got to see it again, this time in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve. No other animal can be as graceful and awkward looking at the same time. Giraffes tire easily so are sprinters as opposed to long-distance runners. They can reach a speed of up to 35 miles per hour and have an unorthodox gait — the front legs and back legs work in unison. In other words, the front right leg moves in tandem with the right back leg and vice versa on the left side.