At night you look for eyeshine: the reflection of light from the tapetum lucidum of the mammals of the Luangwa Valley in Zambia. Baswell swung the mighty spotlight from side to side, eager for the subtlest sign. But this time he didn’t need every single ounce of his considerable skills.

There they were, dancing before us like a swarm of fireflies, two by two by two: 24 eyes in all. Stephen stopped the Land Cruiser and waited as the lights advanced towards us and became lion.

For some reason a big vehicle has no meaningful existence for a lion. So they walked towards us in that slouching, menacing stride, golden eyes fixed ahead, deeply satisfied with their own threatening, sinister progress across the Valley. It was like the opening of West Side Story: here come the Jets like a bat out of hell, someone gets in our way someone don’t feel so well.

They reached the vehicle and, as if performing a much-practiced drill movement, they split to walk either side. I could have reached out and stroked half a dozen of them but thought on the whole better not.

We turned around followed them as they stalked off into the night. They dropped down the river bank and – look, nothing funny, officer, we’re just nice people going out for a quiet drink. They dropped onto their keel-bones and lapped life from the Luangwa River.

The hippos didn’t take this in good part. They caught the scent of the pride and, as one hippo, they ran for it: 50 or 60 of them charging upstream, filling the night with splashing thunder. The lions paid them no mind whatsoever and settled down for a good old think. A planning meeting, no doubt.

Remember the place. We’ll check them out tomorrow, Stephen said. That turned out to be a rather good idea.

• I was co-leading a trip with wildlifeworldwide.com
• Next trip wildlifeworldwide.com/group-tours/walking-safari-in-heart-of-zambia