Well I’m back home and have been for a while now sorry, got caught up in big camp, work, uni etc. >_< anyway ill tell you the rest in two blogs, first one will cover the safari, the second will cover my Mt. Killimanjaro climb, which was definately a once in a lifetime experience.
For now I’ll give you the low down on how the safari went.
Now on to the show.
Though not a bad safari, I think once you’ve seen these animals consistent and up close before, they lose their attraction. Having seen lions playing around, stalking and so close you can touch, then going on another safari and seeing them just sitting in the grass, it doesn’t feel as amazing.
That isn’t to say I didn’t enjoy my trip, there were highlights, such as seeing a baby gazelle’s first steps in the world, driving through the middle of a small herd of elephants, we even got to see a cheetah, though at a distance.
The first day of the safari took us to Manyara National Park, full gazelles, impalas and other strange deer looking things (this was were we saw the baby gazelle). There was also an abundance baboons, at one point we turned the corner to find something like 50 baboons sprawled from the trees on one side of the road to the other, playing, chattering, fighting, eating, it was all pretty cool and we had to slowly move along the road to set them scampering out of our path.
The park overlaps into the great rift valley so theres a windy road up and down to get in an out, but the view of the escarpment is awesome.
Next stop was Ungorongoro crater, though not quite what I thought it would be, it was still pretty nifty in it’s own right. The drive down into the crater was a bit chilly with views of masses of white mist slowly rising, we didn’t get to see any of the crater till we got into it, just a wall of pure white up around and over.
We were greeted by a few Masai attempting to sell us all kinds of jewellery and other bits and bobs, but we escaped out into the crater quickly from here.
The crater was massive, walls rising up from all sides, yet inside still thrived a living ecosystem, predators and prey, it was all there. We managed to catch sight of a cheetah whilst we were there but no leopards at al, though we also saw both black and white rhino’s.
Driving around we came across a safari van that had just happened to have a busted tire, right next to some lazy lions sitting in a tree, fortunately for them the lions were too lazy.
So all in all the Crater was pretty neat, when you think about the fact that it is its own mini system, being isolated from all other wildlife around it for thousands of years. The crater also has one of the highest concentrations of elephants apparently, due to it’s isolation.
Well, i’ve gotta write up my Kilimanjaro blog now ^_^
-josh
