On a recent trip, at the beginning of september, to the Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park, I was keen to photograph a swallow tailed bee eater. My previous encounter with these birds yielded few images taken from a fair distance. They are notoriously shy and fly away when approached making it almost impossible to get close enough to photograph. One morning while on a self drive safari i stopped at the only picnic spot, called dikbaardskolk, some 55 km south of nossob along the nosssob river bed for breakfast. The wind was howling and a lot of dust was in the air so i decide to park behind a tree for a little shelter. As i got out the 4x4 and walked to the rear of the vehicle i happened to notice these two swallow tailed bee eaters perched on a branch behind a thick bush. They appeared to be sheltering form the high wind gusts, I grabbed my fujifilm XT5 and 100-400 lens and took up a position as near to the birds as i could get (approx 10 meters away). To my utter astonishment they just sat on the branch looking in every direction without flying off. The wind was so strong i struggled to hold the camera steady while at the same time keeping a weary eye open for any lions or leopards that may be lurking in the near by bushes. (if they were i wouldnt have stood a chance). result? a delightful batch of images. Mission accomplished. F5.6 ISO 250