I am back from a quick 7-day trip to the Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park in the Kalahari desert, South Africa. It was a veritable "Cheetah Fest" (even though we saw both lion and cheetah every day, the lions were generally being lazy as usual).
This has to be one of the prime spots in Africa to view and photograph cheetah. We saw 12 individuals in total, spread out through 8 sightings in 7 days (all self-driven with no guides and trackers). Among these sightings, we witnessed one kill from start to finish, one unsuccessful hunt, one family feasting on an already made kill.
On this particular morning we found a female named "Gertie" with her 2 cubs drinking at a waterhole. She was carefully watching some springbok further down the dry Auob riverbed (and would eventually stalk them and make a kill) while her youngsters were playing and exploring the area.
Techs:
Nikon D3s with Nikkor 500mm f4 VR-II + 1.4x TC @ 700mm
f8.0 @ 1/1000 SS @ ISO-720
Cropped slightly from top, bottom and LHS


