Wow I wish I knew my animals better. When I roll around Africa, I’m constantly asking, what is THAT animal called again? And the guide is like, “Oh, that’s an ELEPHANT, Trey.” I’m like okay… since when did they have trunks? I think the guides think I am dumb or something… but, actually more, seriously, there are about 100 deer-like creatures with different horns. This one is called like a Springbok or something. Or maybe not. I really don’t know. It’s not an elephant, though.

Deer-like Creature in Africa

Photo Information

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• Date Taken2019-09-19 17:09:57
• CameraILCE-6400
• Camera MakeSony
• Exposure Time1/500
• Aperture6.3
• ISO320
• Focal Length600.0 mm
• FlashOff, Did not fire
• Exposure ProgramManual
• Exposure Bias

I think elephants must be my favorite land-based animal. I’m really looking forward to an AI that lets us talk to animals. Surely an AI can make something like that, you know? It can’t be too impossible… But as soon as that works, I’m gonna have to figure out how to do a zoom call to Africa or something because I have so many questions!

Baby and Mommy Elephant

Photo Information

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• Date Taken2019-09-17 20:58:25
• CameraILCE-6400
• Camera MakeSony
• Exposure Time1/400
• Aperture6.3
• ISO250
• Focal Length200.0 mm
• FlashOff, Did not fire
• Exposure ProgramManual
• Exposure Bias

Most of the sunsets in Africa had this perfect yellow “Lion King” moment. On this particular day, we jumped out of the car (the guides really don’t like that much) – and I ran around a bit just to get this angle. Giraffes can move pretty fast! I wasn’t too worried about getting munched up by a lion or something… well, I was a little worried!

Giraffes in the Wild

Photo Information

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• Date Taken2019-09-18 04:01:16
• CameraILCE-6400
• Camera MakeSony
• Exposure Time1/1250
• Aperture7.1
• ISO800
• Focal Length200.0 mm
• FlashOff, Did not fire
• Exposure ProgramManual
• Exposure Bias

How cool are lions? These male lions are particularly cool looking, even though they spend most of the day doing almost nothing. I seriously think they nap about 20 hours a day, so I was lucky to see this guy. He was basically simply walking from one nap location to the next!

Male Lion in the Wild

Photo Information

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• Date Taken2019-07-17 19:28:42
• CameraILCE-6400
• Camera MakeSony
• Exposure Time1/800
• Aperture6.3
• ISO250
• Focal Length553.0 mm
• FlashOff, Did not fire
• Exposure ProgramManual
• Exposure Bias

These guys look pretty docile but you don’t want to get on their bad side. Some of you may know this already, but the more forward-facing the eyes are (like a wolf), the more of a predator they are. The more the eyes are on the side (like a horse), the more they are often prey. So this will give you a pretty good idea what side of the equation the baboon is on! 🙂

Intense Baboon

Photo Information

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• Date Taken2019-09-21 17:20:05
• CameraILCE-6400
• Camera MakeSony
• Exposure Time1/800
• Aperture6.3
• ISO400
• Focal Length459.0 mm
• FlashOff, Did not fire
• Exposure ProgramAperture-priority AE
• Exposure Bias

The whole time I was there in Botswana, I think I only saw male lions twice, so you can imagine how exciting that was. There was one surprising thing that made photography a little difficult in that these guys can be surrounded by a huge cloud of flies. So I had to spend about half an hour in Photoshop to get rid of all of them… they were just distracting and made the lion look dirty.

Serious Male Lion

Photo Information

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• Date Taken2020-07-08 14:07:09
• Camera
• Camera Make
• Exposure Time
• Aperture
• ISO
• Focal Length
• Flash
• Exposure Program
• Exposure Bias

On our second day in Botswana, we were lucky enough to see this mature male lion. The previous time I was in Africa, I didn’t see a male lion for over two weeks. I don’t know if that was just bad luck or what. The guides always say that luck is a huge factor, but it also depends on each game reserve. This one was a bit smaller and the guides already had a really good idea of where these males lounge about during the day.

Male Lion in the Wild

Photo Information

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• Date Taken2019-07-17 19:29:05
• CameraILCE-6400
• Camera MakeSony
• Exposure Time1/800
• Aperture6.3
• ISO250
• Focal Length266.0 mm
• FlashOff, Did not fire
• Exposure ProgramManual
• Exposure Bias

Man, can you imagine what it would be like to be bitten by an angry lion like that? It’s probably best to stay on her good side. Most of these lions lounge around all day long and never really have many interesting expressions, but if you’re patient enough, you’ll see this once in a blue moon.

Angry Cat Lady

Photo Information

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• Date Taken2019-07-18 02:08:37
• CameraILCE-6400
• Camera MakeSony
• Exposure Time1/250
• Aperture6.3
• ISO160
• Focal Length463.0 mm
• FlashOff, Did not fire
• Exposure ProgramManual
• Exposure Bias

It must be fun to be baby lions, I mean unless you are being eaten. These two sisters already had their two siblings eaten by hyenas. The mom (behind them) has to leave for a few hours a day to feed and bring back snacks… sometimes while mom is gone the kids get munched on a bit.

Baby Lions Relaxing

Photo Information

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• Date Taken2019-09-17 17:41:39
• CameraILCE-6400
• Camera MakeSony
• Exposure Time1/400
• Aperture6.3
• ISO200
• Focal Length326.0 mm
• FlashOff, Did not fire
• Exposure ProgramManual
• Exposure Bias

Male lions may be the laziest animal of all. I just looked it up to confirm and they literally sleep 20 hours a day. It does make me think about the nature of sleep… I think when you sleep, you get into another world. Maybe they’ve evolved so that they can be in that other world way longer than humans. We call it “lazy,” but maybe they actually have a bit more insight into the nature of reality than we do.

Adventuring in Botswana

Photo Information

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• Date Taken2019-09-17 19:28:54
• CameraILCE-6400
• Camera MakeSony
• Exposure Time1/800
• Aperture6.3
• ISO250
• Focal Length571.0 mm
• FlashOff, Did not fire
• Exposure ProgramManual
• Exposure Bias