3rd – 4th – Coming home

I ended up spending the day at the lodge and I took my own taxi to the airport, so it was sitting in the bar and spending time on reading and using the wifi. The trip the airport went better than last time; this driver did not run anyone over this time. What a relief.

The flight hone went well, too. Apparently, when sitting at the emergency exit you are not even allowed to sit reading during take-off and landing. Fair enough – closed the book and put it in the lap, but noo… Not even that was allowed. Nothing in hands nor laps during take-off and landing. I know that you have to be more aware when sitting at the emergency exit but this was taking it to the extreme, I think. Anyways, I made it home safely and another trip was successfully concluded.

Big thanks to our guides Patsie and Moses, and my fellow group members Monika, Daniel, Vince, Kyra, and Emily. It was an amazing trip (might be biased due to the sightings…) and I hope to get the chance to see you all again!

2nd – In the crater on the last day

As we would be leaving the crater at mid-day we departed earlier than usual. Breakfast was served at 0600 and departure when possible which ended up 40 minutes later. Getting out of the tent at around 0520 the sky was clear and you had – for once – an unobstructed view of the stars and Milky Way. Less than 10 minutes later it was all covered by a dense cloud cover. The sunrise was similar; beautiful colors and contrasts to start off with, and moments later it was all covered by clouds.

We drove off to the crater and before reaching the rim we came through several cloudy passages. After an hour, though, the sun had burnt through and the weather turned beautiful. We left mid-day and came back in Arusha 4 hours later where we checked back into the lodge.

We ended up seeing a rhino but unfortunately from a bit of a distance. We saw some lions, a lot of birds, zebras, wildebeests, buffalos and elephants. One saw a cheetah sneaking into some tall grass close to a herd of zebras, but they moved away before anything interesting could have happened. On the way out of the crater we saw 2 wildebeest fighting each other – that was a nice sighting to finish of an amazing safari.

Last time I visited the crater they had app. 25 rhinos. Now they have around 18; only 1 of them was poached, one died of natural causes and the last have been moved to other locations.

Tomorrow is spent on doing nothing; people are departing so they are picked up throughout the day to be brought to their next destinations. I have a flight at 2050 and another have one a few hours earlier – I might decide to join him to the airport; waiting there will probably not be much different from waiting at the lodge.

The zebra keeping a watchful eye on a lion passing by.

Rhino!

Grey crowned crane.

Two grey crowned cranes flying by.

Abdim's stork.

African sacred ibis.

Hippy keeping an eye out.

Yellow green vireo (I think...).

Speeke's weaver.

Pelicans.

Pelicans competing in the not-so-known discipline "Synchronized landing".

Great egret.

It's hard to see on the photo but these elephants were massive.

Close up.

Our last sighting in the crater; two wildebeest having a go at each other.

1st – They said they were hard to find

The day started at the usual time with breakfast at 0700. Camp was taken down in the meantime and 40 minutes later we were off on the last drive in Serengeti. We checked out at around 1400 and drove off towards the camp on the rim of Ngorongoro. It would have been an uneventful – albeit shaky – ride of 2½ hours if it hadn’t been for a flooded bridge. Like many other tours we stopped to assess the situation, and while doing that you could see the flow of water slowly but steady rise. If had rained quite a bit in the mountains – it is the wet season after all – and now all the water had to go somewhere. After some time the water level slowly decreased again, and after an industrial road worker-thingie had crossed proving that the bridge was only flooded and hadn’t disappeared it didn’t take long before the many cars began working themselves across. Arriving at the camp went without further incident. The crossing of the river was almost anti-climactic as after more than an hour’s wait the passing was completely problem-free.

So how did the game drive go? Well, we saw lions. We saw a serval. And we didn’t see a leopard. We saw 2. None were the one from a few days ago, they were independent from each other. The first spotted was close up, we parked just below the tree in which it was relaxing, the second was from a distance and photos were taken just to prove the sighting. 

Male and female ostriches.

Marabu stork.

Monitor lizard.

Lilac breasted roller.

Battle-scarred male lion.

Leopard!

Serval.

Female waterbuck.

Another pride of lions encountered.

Silverbird.

31st – More… MORE!

Today we went on morning and afternoon drives. We left at 0730, came back for lunch at 13300, left at 1530 and returned for the night around 1845.

The drive was like any other game drive; we drove around and looked at animals. Nothing out of the ordinary happened. We got to see elephants up close, a very large herd of buffalos walking in almost single file, stretching out as far as you could see. And we got to see a cheetah up close and lions several times. Who said they were hard to find?

Tomorrow we go on an early game drive and have lunch in the park before leaving to go to the camp at the Ngorongoro Crater.

The second pride of lions had a small one which was full of energy bothering almost all the others. When it started raining all the young ones (below app. 3 years) began moving around and also playing for a bit. That was probably the group of lions we saw with the most amount of energy, a nice change to otherwise just seeing them… lion around.

Bat-eared fox.

Dik-dik.

Kori bustard.

A long herd of buffalos.

The line just keeps on going.... 

... and going... 

... and going... 

... and going... Doesn't it ever stop?!

Little bee-eater.

Red-necked spur-fowl.

Rock hyrax.

Lilac breasted roller.

D'Arnaud's barbet.

Spotted hyena.

Cheetah.

A small group of lions doing as little as possible.

Peek-a-boo!

Martial eagle.