Animals, animals, everywhere!
Friday, July 6th, 2007So we finally got the cash together to go on safari! Our driver and cook came and picked us up at L’Oasis and we were off to Ngorogoro.
Ngorogoro is a crater – volcanic in origin – that has a water source year-round so a lot of the animals just hang out year round unlike the Serengeti where there’s the migration. We saw tons of lions laying about, zebra, hippo (I can honestly say they are just about the funniest – I mean they just kind of lay around in the mud/water and splash water onto themselves – they have tales that kind of have a spoon on the end so it’s just comedy), of course impala, wildebeast (these guys totally crack me up – they make this totally funny noise and have a funny beard – although when I saw them I kept flashing back to this totally lame movie we saw on a bus in S Africa where these zoo lions go out into the wild and get captured by wildebeast and of course they dance – it looked Disney, but I don’t think it was) and the black rhino we saw through binoculars (too far away to see them up close). Anyway, it was like a big zoo.
The funny part was where we camped. There’s this one humongous camp on the edge of the crater (you have to get out of the actual crater by 6 pm or else you get fined) where all the camping safari people camp. And apparently animals feels safe (pretty much feeling safe from lion). We had zebras just wandering around all the tents eating grass, an elephant just hanging and in the morning this buffalo was just looking at us like we were dumb for looking at him.
And we lucked out with our cook, Solomon. Especially looking at some of the stuff some of the other people were eating. Especially the soup. I mean, when you think carrot soup, you think…that sounds just nasty. But it was soooo good. As was the zucchini soup and the leek soup…and we’re talking about a guy cooking with charcoal and having to cook stuff that would wouldn’t go bad over the 5 days. And he was totally cool – we bought a bunch of wine with us and we’d give him a glass each time we opened one.
The 2nd day we drove to the Serengeti. And we saw the coolest thing. Our guide, Tebie (I am so butchering his name but I have no clue) spotted a “fresh kill” in a tree. And where there’s a fresh kill in a tree, there’s a leopard nearby. So like in a little while here comes this leopard going up this tree and starts gnawing on a gazelle. I was seriously awed at this whole thing. I mean, really, how many times are you going to see a friggin’ leopard eating an animal. Oh, and we saw tree-climbing lions. Which I had no idea existed. Apparently, according to our guide, the lions had migrated from Lake Mynara (that is such a name butcher again – I apologize), following food (like Wildebeast and Zebra) and that the native Serengeti lions couldn’t climb because they are too heavy.
That night we camped at Seronera – a smaller camp with facilities that were a bit less than the last camp. And they had these places where you could take a “shower” (sponge-bath). Everyone at the camp was taking these and John and I were like, oh geez, what’s the point – it’s so dusty and you’re going to get all nasty in the morning anyway. We were cracking up when this girl went into the squat toilet (pit), walked out, called to her boyfriend who apparently needed to help her – the look on her face was precious – I’m not sure what people think when they book a “camping safari”, but apparently that wasn’t it!
The next day we went on an early morning game drive and ended up seeing a full-sized male lion and all these cute little cubs that John insisted were going to grow up and be big scary lions but, well, they were cute as cubs. You just wanted to pick them up and hold them (although they were kind of big so they were probably at least 50 lbs!) It’s kind of sad because as soon as you see something cool it gets radioed out and then you’re surrounded by 15 other safari vehicles, but well, I guess that’s how it goes!
After lunch back at the camp, we packed up and headed to Lobo – the camp to the north. On the way we went to the Rhino Pools and saw the funny Rhinos again. It was soooooo different going from the south Serengeti to the north. Lots more trees, lots greener – it was really dry in the south. We were the only ones at the camp on the 3rd night. And a good thing too because there were “very public toilets”. Meaning, the public toilets had nothing around them. Not even a bit of tin. So the bushes were our friends. We went to the lodge for sunset where the safaris that were a bit out of our range housed their peeps – I mean, it doesn’t really get much better than a sunset over the Serengeti.
JohnCin