Safari! Day 5 - This is the real Africa!

This was our first real day on the Serengeti.  We hadn’t gone far before we drove by a pool and discovered a group of Hippo’s (which by now were popular with the kids).  This group was only metres from the vehicle so we got a very good look at them along with a large crocodile that was sneaking around waiting for unsuspecting animals to take a drink!  We discovered just how big Hippo’s can yawn (up to 150 degrees) and how noisy they can be!  It’s hard to take them seriously, they seem to just wallow and float but once in a while, you’ll see this explosion in the water when two of them decide to go at it and you get a sense of just how dangerous they really are.

Lots more Wildebeest, we found another huge block of them… in fact one large herd was approaching our road so we stopped and they crossed about 100’ in front of us.  Without a word of a lie, the herd continued for at LEAST 15 minutes.  It didn’t occur to me to count them until the herd was nearly gone but at one point, they stretched from one horizon to the next.  At any given time, there would be three of them on the road and they were booking it so there must have been thousands, if not tens of thousands in that one herd… and we saw many that day.  You really have to see it to really get how many there are… and all without seeing a single lion or predator!

By the time I thought to get a picture, the herd was thinning out a bit... but this gives you an idea of the density of the line.  This was quite typical... now imagine this goes for 10 miles in either direction!

We drove about 100kms south of the lodge and found a cheetah not far from the road, lots of wart hogs and other animals but at nothing like the density of Lake Manyara or Tarangira.  We also found a few rock rugs (lions) hanging out on the top of some Kjobes.  When they are sleeping, they really do drape over the rocks like a rug. 

About 1000’ down the road, we pulled over to have a picnic lunch however the flies drove Shawn and me nuts and back into the 4x4 but Jen/Rachel were determined to stick it out.  The flies were sort of like our house flies but much lighter.  They didn’t bite but they liked to land around your eyes and lips which would drive you nuts.  Gladly enough though, we’d only seen about 3 mosquitos on the whole trip and about as many Tse Tse flies (in Tarangira).  After a bit, the flies seemed to lose interest in us so we hung around and just enjoyed being out on the plains in the middle of nowhere without another human within 20 miles.

Soon after that, we turned back north to head back towards the lodge and I made a comment about how good the 4 wheel drive seemed to be on the Land Cruisers.  Sam immediately said, they aren’t great and he’d much rather have a Land Rover but the problem with them is that they break down every two or three safari trips.  He said there were places he just wouldn’t go with the Land Cruiser because he didn’t trust it.  It wasn’t 1 km later that we got stuck right up to the axles in a mud hole! 

Out we jump again, out comes the jack as we tried to get some large rocks under the wheels but we couldn’t lift the thing high enough (or rather our jack would sink into the mud faster than we could lift the vehicle despite putting some large patio stone sized rocks under it).  Just how far down does this mud go? 

Anyway, after about 10 minutes of horsing around with the jack, this ranger comes along in a light Land Rover about half the size of our Land Cruiser.   Our guide brings out this tow rope that looks like one of the ones we get at Princess Auto for $5 (the jack was the exact model of Chinese jack I’d bought at Princess Auto as well) and hooks on.  Unfortunately, our vehicle is just too bogged down… and the Land Rover was just digging a hole for itself.  Just as it was apparent that wasn’t going to work, a large 4x4 dump truck rolls along, pulls up and we hook up the tow rope to it.  The driver didn’t even wait for Sam to get behind the wheel and started pulling.  The cheapo rope of course couldn’t take it so it came apart at the seams (just like the one Dad bought about 2 years ago), so they search around in their truck and come out with a cable (really just a 75’ length of solid wire bent back on itself three times).  Anyway, they hook this up to us, Sam gets in and they drag us out, no muss, no fuss.  They all high five each other and then off they go.  A day in the life in Africa!

Anyway, we head through a bunch of other likely spots and don’t see a lot of activity but a few new animals here and there and after an hour long drive back on the plains had just about given up when we came across this pride of lions lying in the short grass right at the side of the road!  We stopped and admired them, again, lazy darn lions sleeping it off… and then one in another patch we hadn’t seen sticks his head up and its Mufasa again!  This pride was 14 lions…  quite cool.

Then we headed back towards the lodge and past the hippo pool again, and this time there is a lone hippo out wandering around in the grass not 25’ from the road!  She’s HUGE.  You don’t really get a good sense of how big they are until they are right beside your vehicle!  No way are you getting outside with one of them around!  Apparently they spend all day in the pool (pooping) and then come out at night to feed on the grass.  They “only” eat 35 Kgs of grass a day – compared to over 300 Kg’s for an elephant but their digestive system is many times more efficient.  You can see it in the spoor.  Elephant poop is nearly undigested whereas the hippo is the green slop I’m used to cleaning up after pigs. 

It’s getting dark, so we have to be off the roads so race back towards the lodge and come across a strange looking antelope with orange feet – a Topi.   They are quite a bit bigger than most of the antelope but have this strange habit of coating their horns in mud to make them more impressive.  A quite cool end to a very long day.

Safari! Day 4 - The Serengeti!

We hadn’t realized this, but to get to the Serengeti, you have to enter the Ngorongoro Conservation Area (which was later on our agenda).  We knew the Ngorogoro Crater was to be one of the highlights of the trip but we hadn’t realized that we would be driving the rim of the crater on the way to the Serengeti.  As is the case most mornings, the east side of the crater was draped in heavy clouds and thick fog so we couldn’t see the crater bottom from the viewing area although it was quite apparent to us that much of the drop offs went down thousands of feet if we missed a corner on those crappy tires!  By the time we’d worked our way around to the west rim, we could see right down into the crater and we got out for a quick look around although the wind was blowing at about 40mph and it was quite cool in our shorts and thin shirts.  From this height, you couldn’t make out individual animals or even cars without the binoculars.  The information centre at the park entrance showed a model of the crater and how it had formed.  It’s about 20kms across and about 3000’ deep from the rim with very steep walls on both sides of the rim road. 

The Ngorogoro mountain was formed millions of years ago as a result of the rift plates separating, bringing magma up from the earth’s core to create a mountain even taller than Kilimanjaro.  The spreading however allowed magma inside the mountain to pour out the side, causing the inside of the mountain to become hollow causing the centre to fall in on itself creating that huge crater (one of the biggest in the world I believe).  The floor is almost flat with a couple of small lakes (one salt, one fresh) and wide open plains.  We weren't able to go down as it was on day 6 of our agenda, so we pressed on to the Serengeti.

We have discovered that although the roads OUTSIDE the parks and conservation areas are great, the ones inside leave something to be desired…  matching the roads to Monteverde in Costa Rica.  Definitely needed a good 4x4 here!  Also, lots of rock hard roads (complete with large boulders) and wash boards that rattle your cavities out.  The solution seemed to be to drive at Warp 1 so that the 4 ton vehicle literally flew over the pot holes and kept the ride somewhat tolerable.  The roads do explain why no vehicle, I’ve seen here have their steering wheels aligned even within 25 degrees.  I can’t imagine owning mag wheels here! 

From the rim, we headed down the west side onto the broad Serengeti Plain which stretched out to the horizon for us.  Once at the bottom of the mountain, it’s still another 18kms on these rough roads to the main gate of the Serengeti so we were still inside the Ngorogoro Conservation Area.  The difference between the Conservation Area and the National Parks is that they allow the native tribes (Masai in this case) to coexist with the animals in a Conservation Area where as they evict them in the National Parks. 

There were about 8 “demonstration” Masai villages on the drive to the gates, and Sam told us these were set up to help the Masai earn enough money to alleviate the impact of not being able to kill the wild animals willy nilly so we decided that we’d stop and have a look.  We were welcomed with a traditional Masai welcome dance where the men jump high into the air and come crashing down on flat feet, while the women sing and egg them to greater and greater heights.  The women also bounce up and down making those beads bounce up and down.  It was quite the sight.

After that, we were invited into the village which was made up about 10 Bomas (small mud huts with roofs made up of cardboard and thatch) and surrounded by thorn branches.  It was explained to us that the first house on the right was occupied by the father’s first wife, his second wife would be the first house on the left, and so on until he ran out of wives.  Each of those wives would look after what ever kids she had with him and he would spend one night with each in strict rotation.  His first son’s first wife had the first house at the back gate on the right side, his second wife’s boma was on the left and so on.  The son’s would stay with the family village until they had 5 wives and 10 cows which ever came first (you get cows as wedding presents).   Our Masai guide was the first son and he was 20 and already had 2 wives and three kids.  He was looking forward to getting his own village soon.

We went into his house which for someone 6’2” means walking completely bent in half.  The bed was raised on sticks with a few skins thown on top and was about the size of a small sofa.  There was a small fire and not much else.  It was about 10x10 at most and made of sticks covered in mud and cow dung (to prevent the mud from “melting” in the rains).  It was apparent they were using just about any piece of garbage to hold the place together.  He then explained much of their culture to us which was interesting but we were starting to get that it was a real tourist trap as he started pointing out how important it was for us to buy stuff from the market which would come next and then tip him and donate to their “kindergarten”.

After the house, we went to see the market which was really made up of all the wives having individual stands.  The kids picked out an item each and then when they tried to buy that, were told that they had to buy it from the first vendor they saw that item at as they do it in strict rotation to give all women a chance.  Half the proceeds go to the woman for materials and allows her to buy a goat and the other half goes to the father to distribute for the village.  It cost a small fortune, but we were guilted into it.

After that, it was into a small hut (outside the village) that contained about 12 small kids (up to 7) quietly sitting on benches while their “teacher” drew wild animals on a chunk of a blackboard (that also had numbers 1-10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90 & 100 on it).  The kids were then encouraged to shout out (in English) the names of the animals.  It was pretty clear to us that this was strictly for the tourists and a bit sad actually as we don’t think the kids were actually learning anything else.  Then it was on to the killing coral where the men sat around and smoked weed and slaughtered goats, or what ever.  We were pretty disappointed with the tour’s authencity but had really wanted to meet some of these Masai and take their pictures as they are an impressive looking people so we got our wishes in that respect at least.  Caveat emptor I guess.

On for another 15kms to the gate of the Serengeti which wasn’t much more than an arch in the middle of nowhere and a guard checking that our Ngorogoro permit hadn’t expired.  The Tanzanian’s are really particular about permits we discovered!

Another 15kms or so and we see this large Kjobe (rock outcropping) with the first bit of green grass we’d seen for 60 kms… and about 2 Million Wildebeest!  Holy mackerel, there are a boat load of Wildebeest (and Zebras) in the Serengeti.  We hadn’t even got to the park entrance yet and the place was full of them as far as the eye could see in either direction!  So much for worrying we wouldn’t be able to find the great Wildebeest migration!  It was lunch time so we took our box lunches and sat up on the Kjobe looking over the plains with about 50 other 4x4’s.  The Serengeti was obviously a very popular place!  We also did a short hike up to the top of the Kjobe and I took a panoramic picture.  Africa sure is beautiful!

After that, back into the Land Cruiser, with the top popped up now, and we raced along the plains alongside the Wildebeest for about 15 kms of rough roads at high speeds again.  I’m not kidding about the 2M animals… I really think there must be something like that there.  After a while, the Wildebeest petered out and the grass went back to its usual brown and we’d go long stretches without seeing anything.  Hard to believe any animal could live on this but Sam assured us there were lots there… including many elusive lions.  About half way to our lodge, Sam got a call on the radio that they’d spotted a leopard in a tree off the road a bit so we did a bit of a detour and arrived there as the second vehicle was pulling away.  Sam was pointing to a tree and saying see the leopard… and I was looking at another tree right beside it and I saw TWO leopards… he was surprised I was looking at the wrong tree and then when I moved the binoculars over to his tree, we noticed yet another leopard in that tree as well.  FOUR leopards in two adjacent trees.  Sam said this was exceedingly rare as they are solitary animals so this must mean that two of them are still juveniles although even having a male/female together is very rare let alone a whole family of them!  They would simply lie over a low branch draped over it like a rug, legs and tails hanging down straight and getting up to move positions once in a while.  It was quite special.

A "Tree Rug" - one of four Leopards we spotted on two adjoining trees

We drove for  a bit more and then heard about a pair of Cheetah’s hanging out on a small Kjobe…  raced over to see them and they were just lying around like a pair of lazy lions….  No quick racing for these two!  They are very beautiful animals though and we’d see many more in the upcoming days.

Then back on the road to head for the Serena Wildlife Lodge on yet another large Kjobe (those things that look like Pride Rock from the Lion King).  This place was more like a traditional hotel and was a bit of a disappointment although the main facilities were blended into the rock in amazing fashion.  This place was much, much larger than the other places (10-20 tents) and we ran into dozens of loud and pushy Germans in a large tour group that kind of ruined our unique experience that we’d been having… but the Serengeti is the place to go so no big surprise there.  One of the things that we’ve noticed on these travels in Tanzania is that Rachel gets a LOT of attention from the wait staff.  They all make it a point to find out her name and then consistently use it and treat her like the little princess she is… trailing her everywhere and not letting her even carry a cup of hot chocolate.  She was a bit freaked out by it, but it was clear that they just loved her to death.  Nobody believes Shawn is only 13.  He’s gotten even skinnier with his NY haircut and looks like he’s 6’ tall (and weighs 98 lbs). 

Another feature of this hotel is that they have what we called Rock Rats (Hyrax) that are actually most closely related to elephants but actually look like oversized guinea pigs.  They aren’t overly disturbed by humans and are all over the rock piles in and around the hotel.  Up on top of the highest rock, they’d built a large deck where you could do another panoramic photo (I did) of the Serengeti plains.  Great shots of the local mountains and huge stretches of plains.  Man, I love Africa!