28th - On a final note

All photos (and more) have been uploaded to my facebook account.

I would like to thank the two lovely Welch nurses that I climbed Kilimanjaro with, Glenna and Carys, for their great company and positive attitude. No matter what bad jokes I might have told, I agree with you; age is just a number on the birth certificate (technically it’s only your birth date that is written there, but you get the point). You are only as old as you feel – not a single year more. Also thanks to our Kili guide Temba, our guide assistant, our waiter Nico and our cook and porters. Without you we couldn’t have done it.

Thank you to Glenna, Carys, Brian (yours was indeed bigger than mine), Heather, Craig, Mark, Marty, Mari, Wally, Sara (our car’s great Swedish animal spotter), Paula, Kathryn and Francis for being the great group you were during the safari. It wouldn’t have been the same without you. And because everyone came directly from climbing Kili on different routes we could share some great stories during the evenings. Thanks to Phil, our excellent guide. Thanks to Mr. T and Emile, our two drivers and backup guides when Phil was in the other car. Thank you to our cooks and logistics people on the team, making sure everything was set and ready when we returned from another dusty dry day on the savannah.

Thanks to our driver Charlie getting us to and back from the gorilla trek. You showed off some crazy amazing driving skills in the 4WD Toyota Hiace. Thanks to our guide, trackers and rangers who expertly led us to the gorillas so fast and giving Marty, I and 6 What’stheirnames a very successful trek.

I hope I’ll meet you all again on another trip.

And don’t worry; I’ll stop the thanking now – it’s beginning to sound like an Oscar speech. Getting too much of the touchy-feely stuff.

28th - Gorilla photos

All photos are in random order.

28th - Only gorillas, no guerillas

The gorilla trek lasted three days; one day to get there from Kampala, one day to do the actual trek, and one day to get back. The drives back and forth lasted around 9-10 hours. Passing through a lot of nature and small towns and settlements, the drive was quite uneventful. We did stop a place where we had fresh pineapples. Fresh as in “harvested a couple of hours ago”. That experience has forever ruined any pineapple for me in the future. Very fresh, sweet and juicy as I have never had one before.

The hotel we stayed at had a 1st assistant manager by the name Friday Fred who serviced us (who looked a little like a small young version of Don Cheadle). I’m not kidding – we even asked him, and that is his real name. He was apparently born on Good Friday, hence the name.

The trek day started early, as we were supposed to show up at a briefing at the gates to Bwindi Inprenetable Forest National Park at 0800, and it required almost two hours of rough driving. After a short briefing we were away, and walking for less than an hour later our guide was contacted by the two trackers who had left earlier that they had made contact with the gorillas, and that they were just waiting for us to show up. An hour later walking though some rough terrain we finally arrived. We met a family of 19 individuals; 3 silverbacks, 1 blackback and otherwise covering all ages. It was a beautiful sight, but unfortunately we only had one hour with them before we had to leave. We were lucky that they were out in the open so they were easier to see, but the foliage was still so tall that the largest silverback could take a few steps and completely disappear from view.

Getting back to the gate was actually surprisingly tough; going upwards wasn’t much different from climbing Kili, but now it was hot and humid. And you had to wear long pants so that you wouldn’t get bitten by ants. But we got back and got our diplomas (!), got back to the hotel and had a much needed bath.

Travelling back to Kampala was just as uneventful, but that changed when we reached the city. It had been raining heavily for some time, and as the city doesn’t have much of a drainage system, water was literally flowing everywhere. We were completely stuck in one place almost half an hour due to the traffic getting jammed, and it took us 1½ hours to travel the same distance which took a couple of minutes going out. Fun.

24th - Going to Kampala

People drive in the left side of the road in Tanzania.

This part of my trip deserves its own post. Not because of the flights (Kilimanjaro -> Nairobi, waiting 3 hours and then Nairobi -> Entebbe), the taxi drive to the hotel or the waiting game at the airport. Not because of the mentioned, but because of the first five minutes from leaving the lodge in Arusha. The taxi picked me up at 0600, and when leaving the gravel road where the lodge was located and going onto the paved road, it happened. Ever since I arrived in Africa I have been surprised how crazy people drive without any accidents happening. People drive aggressively, but not angrily, which might be part of the reason why things are the way they are.

Anyway, leaving the gravel road in darkness, the driver looks very briefly to the right, after which he looks to the left, and not seeing anyone, he begins pulling out and turning to the right. At that moment a very dark shadow enters my vision from the right – a guy on a bicycle. He got bigger and bigger, and I thought it was my depth of vision screwing with me (very early, and not much sleep as we were staying quite late at the bar last night to say our goodbyes with the group) until I heard a loud thunk. What did the driver do? Still looking left, he didn’t brake, he actually tried to speed up. This resulted in that the poor biker went up on the hood, across the windscreen and over and down on the ground down behind me on the left. The driver swore, completed his turn, and then hesitated just long enough for me to suspect that he would have continued if I hadn’t been there. Fortunately he pulled over and left the car – and checked the front first. He then went over to the biker, and came back a couple of minutes later, which felt like hours. He drove on and when asked he said that the biker was fine. Maybe he was, but he could just as well have given him a bunch of money so that he’d keep his mouth shut or something. Or just given him a whack on the head to get him to stop complaining for all that I know. Fun morning!

The really fun part is that 5 minutes later he almost pulled off the same stunt again – the biker did stop by himself this time so nothing happened, all while my driver was looking to the left.

23rd - Safari photos, other

This is just a mix of various animals spotted during the safari in random order.

Random bird of prey.

This was how popular the leopard was. Imagine 30-40 meters of road like this.



There were quite a few of these very colorful birds.

A hippo in mid-roll.

Pelikans.

Impala.

Olive baboon.

Tucan.

Ostrich.

Wildebeest.

Crocodile, one of the few we saw and the only one out of the water.

Warthogs.

This was one of the vehicles we drove around in. The roof is lifted making it possible to get "out" of the car and get a better view (and taking photos without having a window between you and the target).

Buffalo.

Zebra.

A very colorful lizard. You could find them warming themselves in the sun, and some of them let you get very close before they ran away.

Jackal.

Hyena.

Giraffe.

23rd - Safari photos, elephant

I have a lot of elephant photos so there's a chance that I still have better than these, but they have to do for now.

Can I get an "aaaawwww"?

An elephant came into the camp we stayed at before going down into the Ngorongoro crater and drank from the water supply. Apparently it's a common sight. Half an hour later a much larger elephant came and did the same. Before the first left the camp it trashed a pile of food lying out in the open and ate most of it while the owners couldn't do anything but just get out of its way and watch.

Bonus shot - elephant in the front (you can just see its back) and rhino in the rear. The two largest of The Big 5 in one shot.

23rd - Safari photos, rhino

As the rhinos where up to 1 km away, I have cut out the animals from the photos so there's a chance to see them instead of being a small speck in the distance (even more so when the photos are made smaller when uploaded to the blog), so expect grainy quality. If anyone want to see the photos in full please let me know.

The same rhino as above, but with the kid emerging (see the half back through the two right-most trunks).


A rhino that has been doping its horns?

Nope - just two parents with their kid!

23rd - Safari photos, lion

This was the only thing we saw of the lions. Just a few, right?

Something scared them, and suddently we saw this...

It's probably difficult to see from the photos, but the pride contained at least 20-30 individuals. And in the end, when the entire group had crossed the road, the male lion got up and a couple of photos were shot before he disappeared in the long grass again.