On the 23rd of October we crossed from Kenya to Tanzania. It was a rather tense journey for much of the way as passing in and out of coverage zones made it difficult to keep a close eye on the rugby score - all's well that ends well though and by the time we reached the Tanzanian border, the ABs were RWC champs for 2011 - woo hoo! Thanks mum, dad, Nikhil and Tony for all the progress updates along the way!
Our first week in Tanzania was happily dominated by game drives in the Ngorongoro Crater and the Serengeti. The Crater landscape is amazing - you drive up the outside of it through pretty dense bush before reaching the rim, where we stopped for a quick photo opp. It's breathtakingly beautiful the way it just drops and stretches out in front of you. Shortly after leaving the lookout point, we rounded the corner in our 4WD and came across a large male lion sauntering down the road - mental, but a good reminder that you're out in the wild and probably shouldn't wander too far from the vehicle!
The rains are apparently late this year, so the Crater itself was rather barren. From the lookout you could see the sunlight catch on the little streams and lakes in the bed of the Crater, but they were few and far between. We saw a number of lions, even more warthogs, and a large pride/gang/school (what's the word?!) of hippos. We also saw a rhino in the distance but needed to magnify our photos to the max to verify the spot, so I'm unsure whether it actually counts!
Our A team truck (A-1 to be exact) were initially a little put out when we were ordered to stay in the stinking hot 4WD while we ate our lunch - 5 minutes later though, Livingstone (our guide - got to love the name!) looked like a fortune telling legend as the al fresco diners were attacked by monkeys and kites who'd swoop in, steal some tasty morsel and then retire to enjoy it in their own sweet time!
After leaving the Crater, we headed straight into the Serengeti National Park, where the plains were full of long, dry, yellow grass, the occasional acacia tree and the odd, dusty whirlwind here and there. The grass was perfect for camoflauging lions but fortunately Livingstone proved equally good at spotting them.
If you spot a line of parked up trucks when you're on a game drive, you inevitably head towards them to check out what's going on because you know that they've probably spotted something good. When that happened in the Serengeti, there was a rumour going round that there was a leopard hiding behind/in the log that everyone was crowded round. After about half an hour, we started to think that maybe it was just a rumour as noone we talked to had actually spotted the growingly infamous big cat. At that point, the thunder and black rain clouds started to roll in and we were distracted by the sight of a perfect rainbow arching over the log and a couple of acacia trees. When we looked back at the log as the first few raindrops started to fall, the leopard had hopped on top and was now in prime viewing/photo taking position for those relatively few trucks that had been patient enough to hold on. A few minutes later we were rewarded even further when its tiny, 2 week old cub hopped on the log to play as well. The light was perfect, the subject was amazing - a photographer's dream!
We camped out under the starts in the Serengeti that night and were warned to keep everything, shoes included, in the tents to avoid wild animals running off with them. We were also told that if we absolutely had to go during the night, we had to either pee (quickly) on/near the tent of someone beside you who you didn't like(!) or to take a friend to the sole toilet at the campsite so that they could keep watch for you. Under no circumstances were we to go out on our own. Ironically, it was about the time we were all sitting round the fire, just after Anzac had assured us that there were definitely too many people around for the animals to come really close, that a hyena chose to walk 5m behind the ground and through the tents. Clearly there was NO way that I'd be going to the bathroom that night!
No comments:
Post a Comment