TANZANIA 2
19th-23rd June.
After our trip to Zanzibar, we left and went up north about 70km to a Village called Bagamoya, again a village from around about the 1800’s. Being on the sea it was also related to the slave trade years. Very much a small place of old buildings like “Stone Town”. The now fish market was originally the slave market. There is a very impressive 2 storey building “German Boma” which is now being restored; an old fort built by an Arab trader in 1860 as a stone prison with a subterranean passage which leads to a landing point where the slaves were herded into dhows on the shore. Since then the Germans used it as a garrison and later it was used as a police post. Today it is the department of Antiquities. In the same grounds there is a plaque “Hanging Tree: it was here the Germans hung Africans who were considered insufficiently sympathetic to their rule, (nothing changed much!!!!!!!) About 5km out of town we visited the “Koole Ruins”. The main ruin is of a large Mosque, the stairs to the pray room still partly intact; 22 graves including four tall pillar tomb stones of about 7 m high. According to the guide, the higher the tomb stone the more important the person was. A well, which still holds fresh water, is next to a footbath. The mosque is said to be consistent from the 7th century.
We also visited the “Holy Ghost Mission” built in 1872. One of the oldest churches on the east African Mainland. A newer church was constructed before World War 1 and is really very simple but beautiful. I went to mass there on Sunday (in Swahili) before leaving for Arusha.
On our way up to Arusha, we stayed over at Moshi, the town at the base of Mount Kilimanjaro, hoping to get the at least a photo of a sunrise or sunset with the famous mountain, but we weren’t in luck. Neither afternoon nor morning gave us a clear view. Apparently at this time of the year it usually is clouded over. Reminds you a little of “Gods Window”
Spent one night (enough for anyone) in Arusha, filling up with the necessary stocks. Managed to get brandy KWV 3year old, (cheaper than Klippie-R120) for R85.00. Diesel is cheaper outside of the city but not too bad at an average of R8.40 per lt. If you are in a party of 6 then using a tour operator into the parks works out cheaper but us being only two this did not pan out and we decided to do the parks on our own.
24th -26th June.
Tarangire National Park.
We left early and managed to get into the park by 11.30. All park entrance fees are worked on a 24hour basis. If you get in by 11.30 then you must be out the next day at 11.30. Costs for this park were US$35 each, the car US$40 and camping in the public campsite, US$30 each. So each day cost us US$170. The private camp sites which have no facilities at all are US$50 each. We decided to save a bit and went to the public campsite; you do get cold water showers and clean toilets. Anyway, we made the most of our time there. Out on a drive until 6pm and getting up and out by 6.30am in the morning. (Robyn that’s when you asked me why we were up so early in your sms) At this rate you see as much as you can. We certainly did that, our first drive yielded thousands of Zebras, Wildebeest, hundreds of Elephants, lots of Giraffe (Massai- they are really dark), impala and lots of Thompson’s Gazelle’s The unusual was a Kirks Dik Dik. In smaller numbers, buffalo, Kongoni (type of Hartebeest, similar to the red but lighter in colour, warthog and Defassa Water buck. Birds of prey – unbelievable. The marabou storks almost in every tree in and around the water. The bird life was tremendous, birds seen here that were not familiar at home, were the Superb Starling; Ashey Starling; Yellow Necked Spurfouwl; Barefaced Go away Bird, the Tanzanian Red Billed Hornbill, Magpie Long Tailed Shrike, and a White faced buffalo weaver.
In general this park is more densely vegetated than Serengeti and a mix of acacia and mixed woodland. Baobab trees abundant throughout the park. They say that you can see 500 elephant in a day and honestly I think we did. Much to Dawn’s delight!!!! They have an unusual antelope, a Gerenuk but no matter how hard we tried we weren’t in any luck to get a glimpse of it.
Altogether a super park, I would not have missed it.
26th & 27th June.
On our way to the next park, we visited the Massinga Snake Park, where a couple who had left Durban (Pinetown) about 17 years ago and built up a camp site, restaurant and bar and the snake park. Lynn and Barry, were really super and helped us plan the next few days. When the arrived (20km outside of Arusha) there was actually nothing, just sand and sand. We left them and stayed outside of Lake Manyara Park at a small village called Mto wa Mbu.. Took a day drive into the park, arrived at the gate at 6.10am to be told unfortunately the office staff had not arrived. Had to wait until 6.45am for them to arrive. (So don’t think SA is so bad) They were not really perturbed it was a Saturday and that seems to mean the start of the weekend and they can be late. The shop at the gate did not even open, it should have been open from 8am until 5pm.
This national park is about 330 square kilometres but about two thirds of this is made up of water. The land is made up of a grassy floodplain, a belt of thick acacia woodland and a lush and extensive patch of groundwater forest. On entering, you go through the forest, where we saw, the blue monkey (which looks black with a very long tail and very shy) a Silvery-cheeked Hornbill, (check your books, very different to any of our hornbills) and the Olive Baboon. (A little different in face features.) In the rest of the forest we had lots and lots of butterflies and quite a few very shy bushbucks.
We then went onto see herds and herds of Wildebeest, Zebra and lots of elephants (very big tuskers). The unusual was the Kirk’s Dik Dik. Lake Manyara is famous for its tree climbing lions; unfortunately we did not see any. Our highlight was Flamingos. We travelled along side shoreline for 3km+ and we were treated to the most magnificent sight of Flamingo’s, meters deep, as far as the eye could see. At one waterhole, we had dozens of huge pelicans; at least 20 of the common water birds, Zebras, Wildebeest, Hippos. Birds of a difference in the park were again the Bare-faced Go-away birds, the Superb starling, the Ashey Starling. Altogether we identified about 30 different birds and equally as many as we could not identify.
.
28th June to the 2nd July.
We left on Sunday after church and a leisurely breakfast for Ngorongora Conservation Area.
Here we killed some time stopping on route for lunch (very fresh chicken and chips, I am sure they just killed it when they saw us arrive!!!!!!) This way we could get into the N.C.A only by about 3pm as again here you are charged per 24hour period. We wanted to go into the crater the next morning early and we needed to be out of the NGA by 3pm the next day in order to get to camp in the Serengeti by 5pm. You really have to time yourself well.
Just a little bit of info on the area and Crater, if you are not interested just page down, but for those (like me) who do not know and would like to, I will add some info.
Over 500 million years ago, the rock that underlies the area was formed. Movements in the earth’s crust forced the rock up above sea level exposing it to weather. Rain, sun and wind broke and sculpted the rock for millions of years. The hardest of the ancient rocks have endured these unrelenting forces of erosion. They now jut from the plains as hills and inselbergs. You can see the hard, white or reddish quartzite capping the softer, grey or pink gneiss in the Gol Mountains and the Lemuta Hill. The kopjes on the Serengeti Plain are mostly gneiss and granite, the remnants of old hills that are still eroding away. 200 million years ago the super continent “Pangaea” started splitting apart. 20million years ago the earths crust weakened then split. The edges of this pulled apart and the land between sank. The sunken land melted underneath so even hotter lava could rise through fissures to build the volcanoes.
When rifting started in the Ngorongoro area, the cliff that was thrust up as the land sank to the east formed today’s Eyasi escarpment. This old rift wall run past Lake Eyasi as a spectacular granite cliff up to 1000metres high, then under the Ngorongoro highlands, and along the east side of the Gol Mountains. Most of this early rift is now obscured by the lava that began to well out of the fracture some 15 million years ago. The lava built up layer by layer. Eventually, fresh lava could only find a limited number of openings, and these built slowly into volcanoes. From the layering of distinctive basalt and ash from each volcano we can guess that among the oldest are Oldeani, Sadiman and Lemagrut. Sadiman’s eruption 3.6million years ago preserved the “fossil footprints” at Laetoli. Oldeani stopped growing when it exploded, creating a great cleft facing west. Ngorongoro was slowly accumulating bulk, and by 2.5 million years ago may have rivalled Kilimanjaro in size. But as its vents filled with solid rock, the molten material was forced elsewhere. As the lava subsided, the top Ngorongoro collapsed inward, forming the caldera.
By about two million years ago, the main features of this area had been formed and volcanic activity diminished. The new mountains caught the rain which began to carryout canyons. The water carried stone and mud downwards, cascading over escarpment and spreading out into lakes in the lowlands. The lakes that formed in the broad rift valley were then much larger that they are today. The minerals that were washed into the lakes built up, making the water alkaline and leaving deep soda pans when dried up. The shallow lake fluctuates and still varies in size from season to season year to year.
As you view the present landscape, you can appreciate the great age of the worn crystalline hills and kopjes and the richness of the plains. They say that a grander setting for the wildlife you could not see.
When you reach the crater rim there is the most super view. You are about 2200 metres above sea-level. There are both dry and wet sides to the Crater’s rim. To the east and south-east the rim is clothed in forest and very often blanketed in fog. The west and northeast are dry. From the rim you can look down some five hundred metres to the crater floor (only some of us with good eyes.) Open grassland, streams, swamps, lakes, forests, hills and steep slopes. All this allows so many animals to live together in a small area. There is plenty of water and this enables so many grazing animals and predators to live here.
Okay now that you have got a bit of “geography”/”history”. I will get down to what we saw and experienced. We camped on the rim, unfortunately it was quite overcast and we did not get a nice sunset. But the excitement was there, it is unbelievable what you feel. We were woken up in the night to a noise outside, Wolf got out, flashlight (thanks to the Maier’s) and right about 8 mts away were two huge elephants, one was a tusker of note. Gee what adrenaline. We were ready by 6am to go down. It was still fairly dark but by the time we started descending it was getting light, still a little overcast.
It passes around the lip of the crater for about 7km and then contours along the slopes of the depression and suddenly opens up to an eastern view of the crater floor. The road dives steeply down the inner wall of the crater. The side of the crater is still the main entrance and exit route for wild animals and livestock (who still are allowed in the crater.) You descend slowly because of the steep and windy rocky road and have really time to look at the vegetation and birds.
The area below is very difficult to describe, 260 square km. Forest almost all yellow fever trees; Swamp; open grasslands; and the lakes.
We were lucky to see lots of lions, herds of zebras, wildebeest, Thompson’s and Grants Gazelles; and buffalo. On the lesser side, side and black backed jackal, Hyena, Kongoni and Topi. Bird wise about 16 species we had not seen on our trip before, and lots of what we had seen. The lakes were really great and the forest areas really great. Unfortunately, we needed to be up and out of the crater by noon to be able to fetch our trailer and get through the NCA by 3pm. (A bit expensive for less than 6 hours in the crater itself, R3400, although this does include the whole24 hours) A once in a lifetime experience.
On a really corrugated road, taking about 2 and half hours, to do 85km. We reached Seronera, almost the centre of Serengeti where we had booked for three days. You can only book a public camp site if you have done it at Arusha and then if there is space, unfortunately we could not get one but this turned out quite well, we had a camp site bordering a plain, which when we arrived was full of zebras and wildebeest. On our way in, we saw lots of the normal but the unusual for us was a lion in a tree. We still have not got used to this yet. Set up camp and went for a quick drive. After a super night, with lions roaring from two different directions, hyenas and jackals calls, we got up early and went for a five hour drive. For me Serengeti was the ultimate, we were rewarded with thousands and thousands of Zebra and Wildebeest, Elephants, lions on rocks and in trees, Buffalo, Giraffe, Topi, Kongoni, Warthogs, Tree Hyrax, Hippos, Crocodile and even two Cheetah. All in one game drive. Birds again, lots and lots. The birds of prey, too many to count and some even impossible to identify. The unusual were, Chestnut Bellied Sandgrousse; Cinnamon Chested Bee- eater; Fishers Love Bird; a Shelly’s Starling; Greater Blue-eared Starling; a Darnaubs Barbet; Blue Headed Cougal.
Early next morning, we were treated to the most magnificent noise of three different prides of lions all calling from different directions, when the sound was really close, Wolf got out of the tent, with Maier Spotlight, there no more than 25mts were 3 lionesses and one male lion walking across the plain.
For me the Serengeti had been the highlight of my trip so far. Wolf was very awed by the Crater and Serengeti and the start of the migration.
Our trip out of the Serengeti was no less tremendous, at times we had Wildebeest and Zebra’s as far as the eye could see. The Wildebeest were running in front of us for minutes as a time and then across the plains and back again. Just hope Heather and Nick we will see the same. Once out of the park, we took a day to just cool off and make notes and acknowledge how lucky we were to be able to spend this time and able to still afford this wonderful experience.
2nd – 3rd July.
Spent two nights at Mwanza on Lake Victoria at the Mwanza Yacht club. Had a couple of meals out, including another “Fresh Chicken”, met some super SA men who were playing squash, and gave us a good supermarket to shop in, and a pizza place for a meal. Really good but really pricey. Wolf had broken his glasses and after a run around of directions, got a new frame for R120.00. Had my spare pair which I broke, at the hot springs, (had too much too drink and fell in the pool) fixed for nothing. Had a small repair to the car fixed at a Mitsubishi agent for a very reasonable price. (No invoice of course)
Left on the 4th July for Rwanda
Just a few additions.
In Tanzania, all speed bumps, and they have hundreds, especially through all the towns, some are one big, some are 5 small bumps, and some are just dreadful, they are called ‘SLEEPING POLICEMAN” and they work, they irritate the hell out of Wolfgang. The only good thing is they don’t give out fines. We did however manage to pick up one speeding fine, 45km in a 30km speed zone which “of coarse” Wolf did not see, so negotiated the fine with lots of s—t talking and laughing and the end result, Tanz. Shillings, 10,000 (R65.00)
Our highlights, all the parks,(even with the high costs) the lowlights lots of cold showers, some of the corrugated roads in the parks, and the campsite in Arusha was horrific.(Massai Campsite, not recommended)
19th-23rd June.
After our trip to Zanzibar, we left and went up north about 70km to a Village called Bagamoya, again a village from around about the 1800’s. Being on the sea it was also related to the slave trade years. Very much a small place of old buildings like “Stone Town”. The now fish market was originally the slave market. There is a very impressive 2 storey building “German Boma” which is now being restored; an old fort built by an Arab trader in 1860 as a stone prison with a subterranean passage which leads to a landing point where the slaves were herded into dhows on the shore. Since then the Germans used it as a garrison and later it was used as a police post. Today it is the department of Antiquities. In the same grounds there is a plaque “Hanging Tree: it was here the Germans hung Africans who were considered insufficiently sympathetic to their rule, (nothing changed much!!!!!!!) About 5km out of town we visited the “Koole Ruins”. The main ruin is of a large Mosque, the stairs to the pray room still partly intact; 22 graves including four tall pillar tomb stones of about 7 m high. According to the guide, the higher the tomb stone the more important the person was. A well, which still holds fresh water, is next to a footbath. The mosque is said to be consistent from the 7th century.
We also visited the “Holy Ghost Mission” built in 1872. One of the oldest churches on the east African Mainland. A newer church was constructed before World War 1 and is really very simple but beautiful. I went to mass there on Sunday (in Swahili) before leaving for Arusha.
On our way up to Arusha, we stayed over at Moshi, the town at the base of Mount Kilimanjaro, hoping to get the at least a photo of a sunrise or sunset with the famous mountain, but we weren’t in luck. Neither afternoon nor morning gave us a clear view. Apparently at this time of the year it usually is clouded over. Reminds you a little of “Gods Window”
Spent one night (enough for anyone) in Arusha, filling up with the necessary stocks. Managed to get brandy KWV 3year old, (cheaper than Klippie-R120) for R85.00. Diesel is cheaper outside of the city but not too bad at an average of R8.40 per lt. If you are in a party of 6 then using a tour operator into the parks works out cheaper but us being only two this did not pan out and we decided to do the parks on our own.
24th -26th June.
Tarangire National Park.
We left early and managed to get into the park by 11.30. All park entrance fees are worked on a 24hour basis. If you get in by 11.30 then you must be out the next day at 11.30. Costs for this park were US$35 each, the car US$40 and camping in the public campsite, US$30 each. So each day cost us US$170. The private camp sites which have no facilities at all are US$50 each. We decided to save a bit and went to the public campsite; you do get cold water showers and clean toilets. Anyway, we made the most of our time there. Out on a drive until 6pm and getting up and out by 6.30am in the morning. (Robyn that’s when you asked me why we were up so early in your sms) At this rate you see as much as you can. We certainly did that, our first drive yielded thousands of Zebras, Wildebeest, hundreds of Elephants, lots of Giraffe (Massai- they are really dark), impala and lots of Thompson’s Gazelle’s The unusual was a Kirks Dik Dik. In smaller numbers, buffalo, Kongoni (type of Hartebeest, similar to the red but lighter in colour, warthog and Defassa Water buck. Birds of prey – unbelievable. The marabou storks almost in every tree in and around the water. The bird life was tremendous, birds seen here that were not familiar at home, were the Superb Starling; Ashey Starling; Yellow Necked Spurfouwl; Barefaced Go away Bird, the Tanzanian Red Billed Hornbill, Magpie Long Tailed Shrike, and a White faced buffalo weaver.
In general this park is more densely vegetated than Serengeti and a mix of acacia and mixed woodland. Baobab trees abundant throughout the park. They say that you can see 500 elephant in a day and honestly I think we did. Much to Dawn’s delight!!!! They have an unusual antelope, a Gerenuk but no matter how hard we tried we weren’t in any luck to get a glimpse of it.
Altogether a super park, I would not have missed it.
26th & 27th June.
On our way to the next park, we visited the Massinga Snake Park, where a couple who had left Durban (Pinetown) about 17 years ago and built up a camp site, restaurant and bar and the snake park. Lynn and Barry, were really super and helped us plan the next few days. When the arrived (20km outside of Arusha) there was actually nothing, just sand and sand. We left them and stayed outside of Lake Manyara Park at a small village called Mto wa Mbu.. Took a day drive into the park, arrived at the gate at 6.10am to be told unfortunately the office staff had not arrived. Had to wait until 6.45am for them to arrive. (So don’t think SA is so bad) They were not really perturbed it was a Saturday and that seems to mean the start of the weekend and they can be late. The shop at the gate did not even open, it should have been open from 8am until 5pm.
This national park is about 330 square kilometres but about two thirds of this is made up of water. The land is made up of a grassy floodplain, a belt of thick acacia woodland and a lush and extensive patch of groundwater forest. On entering, you go through the forest, where we saw, the blue monkey (which looks black with a very long tail and very shy) a Silvery-cheeked Hornbill, (check your books, very different to any of our hornbills) and the Olive Baboon. (A little different in face features.) In the rest of the forest we had lots and lots of butterflies and quite a few very shy bushbucks.
We then went onto see herds and herds of Wildebeest, Zebra and lots of elephants (very big tuskers). The unusual was the Kirk’s Dik Dik. Lake Manyara is famous for its tree climbing lions; unfortunately we did not see any. Our highlight was Flamingos. We travelled along side shoreline for 3km+ and we were treated to the most magnificent sight of Flamingo’s, meters deep, as far as the eye could see. At one waterhole, we had dozens of huge pelicans; at least 20 of the common water birds, Zebras, Wildebeest, Hippos. Birds of a difference in the park were again the Bare-faced Go-away birds, the Superb starling, the Ashey Starling. Altogether we identified about 30 different birds and equally as many as we could not identify.
.
28th June to the 2nd July.
We left on Sunday after church and a leisurely breakfast for Ngorongora Conservation Area.
Here we killed some time stopping on route for lunch (very fresh chicken and chips, I am sure they just killed it when they saw us arrive!!!!!!) This way we could get into the N.C.A only by about 3pm as again here you are charged per 24hour period. We wanted to go into the crater the next morning early and we needed to be out of the NGA by 3pm the next day in order to get to camp in the Serengeti by 5pm. You really have to time yourself well.
Just a little bit of info on the area and Crater, if you are not interested just page down, but for those (like me) who do not know and would like to, I will add some info.
Over 500 million years ago, the rock that underlies the area was formed. Movements in the earth’s crust forced the rock up above sea level exposing it to weather. Rain, sun and wind broke and sculpted the rock for millions of years. The hardest of the ancient rocks have endured these unrelenting forces of erosion. They now jut from the plains as hills and inselbergs. You can see the hard, white or reddish quartzite capping the softer, grey or pink gneiss in the Gol Mountains and the Lemuta Hill. The kopjes on the Serengeti Plain are mostly gneiss and granite, the remnants of old hills that are still eroding away. 200 million years ago the super continent “Pangaea” started splitting apart. 20million years ago the earths crust weakened then split. The edges of this pulled apart and the land between sank. The sunken land melted underneath so even hotter lava could rise through fissures to build the volcanoes.
When rifting started in the Ngorongoro area, the cliff that was thrust up as the land sank to the east formed today’s Eyasi escarpment. This old rift wall run past Lake Eyasi as a spectacular granite cliff up to 1000metres high, then under the Ngorongoro highlands, and along the east side of the Gol Mountains. Most of this early rift is now obscured by the lava that began to well out of the fracture some 15 million years ago. The lava built up layer by layer. Eventually, fresh lava could only find a limited number of openings, and these built slowly into volcanoes. From the layering of distinctive basalt and ash from each volcano we can guess that among the oldest are Oldeani, Sadiman and Lemagrut. Sadiman’s eruption 3.6million years ago preserved the “fossil footprints” at Laetoli. Oldeani stopped growing when it exploded, creating a great cleft facing west. Ngorongoro was slowly accumulating bulk, and by 2.5 million years ago may have rivalled Kilimanjaro in size. But as its vents filled with solid rock, the molten material was forced elsewhere. As the lava subsided, the top Ngorongoro collapsed inward, forming the caldera.
By about two million years ago, the main features of this area had been formed and volcanic activity diminished. The new mountains caught the rain which began to carryout canyons. The water carried stone and mud downwards, cascading over escarpment and spreading out into lakes in the lowlands. The lakes that formed in the broad rift valley were then much larger that they are today. The minerals that were washed into the lakes built up, making the water alkaline and leaving deep soda pans when dried up. The shallow lake fluctuates and still varies in size from season to season year to year.
As you view the present landscape, you can appreciate the great age of the worn crystalline hills and kopjes and the richness of the plains. They say that a grander setting for the wildlife you could not see.
When you reach the crater rim there is the most super view. You are about 2200 metres above sea-level. There are both dry and wet sides to the Crater’s rim. To the east and south-east the rim is clothed in forest and very often blanketed in fog. The west and northeast are dry. From the rim you can look down some five hundred metres to the crater floor (only some of us with good eyes.) Open grassland, streams, swamps, lakes, forests, hills and steep slopes. All this allows so many animals to live together in a small area. There is plenty of water and this enables so many grazing animals and predators to live here.
Okay now that you have got a bit of “geography”/”history”. I will get down to what we saw and experienced. We camped on the rim, unfortunately it was quite overcast and we did not get a nice sunset. But the excitement was there, it is unbelievable what you feel. We were woken up in the night to a noise outside, Wolf got out, flashlight (thanks to the Maier’s) and right about 8 mts away were two huge elephants, one was a tusker of note. Gee what adrenaline. We were ready by 6am to go down. It was still fairly dark but by the time we started descending it was getting light, still a little overcast.
It passes around the lip of the crater for about 7km and then contours along the slopes of the depression and suddenly opens up to an eastern view of the crater floor. The road dives steeply down the inner wall of the crater. The side of the crater is still the main entrance and exit route for wild animals and livestock (who still are allowed in the crater.) You descend slowly because of the steep and windy rocky road and have really time to look at the vegetation and birds.
The area below is very difficult to describe, 260 square km. Forest almost all yellow fever trees; Swamp; open grasslands; and the lakes.
We were lucky to see lots of lions, herds of zebras, wildebeest, Thompson’s and Grants Gazelles; and buffalo. On the lesser side, side and black backed jackal, Hyena, Kongoni and Topi. Bird wise about 16 species we had not seen on our trip before, and lots of what we had seen. The lakes were really great and the forest areas really great. Unfortunately, we needed to be up and out of the crater by noon to be able to fetch our trailer and get through the NCA by 3pm. (A bit expensive for less than 6 hours in the crater itself, R3400, although this does include the whole24 hours) A once in a lifetime experience.
On a really corrugated road, taking about 2 and half hours, to do 85km. We reached Seronera, almost the centre of Serengeti where we had booked for three days. You can only book a public camp site if you have done it at Arusha and then if there is space, unfortunately we could not get one but this turned out quite well, we had a camp site bordering a plain, which when we arrived was full of zebras and wildebeest. On our way in, we saw lots of the normal but the unusual for us was a lion in a tree. We still have not got used to this yet. Set up camp and went for a quick drive. After a super night, with lions roaring from two different directions, hyenas and jackals calls, we got up early and went for a five hour drive. For me Serengeti was the ultimate, we were rewarded with thousands and thousands of Zebra and Wildebeest, Elephants, lions on rocks and in trees, Buffalo, Giraffe, Topi, Kongoni, Warthogs, Tree Hyrax, Hippos, Crocodile and even two Cheetah. All in one game drive. Birds again, lots and lots. The birds of prey, too many to count and some even impossible to identify. The unusual were, Chestnut Bellied Sandgrousse; Cinnamon Chested Bee- eater; Fishers Love Bird; a Shelly’s Starling; Greater Blue-eared Starling; a Darnaubs Barbet; Blue Headed Cougal.
Early next morning, we were treated to the most magnificent noise of three different prides of lions all calling from different directions, when the sound was really close, Wolf got out of the tent, with Maier Spotlight, there no more than 25mts were 3 lionesses and one male lion walking across the plain.
For me the Serengeti had been the highlight of my trip so far. Wolf was very awed by the Crater and Serengeti and the start of the migration.
Our trip out of the Serengeti was no less tremendous, at times we had Wildebeest and Zebra’s as far as the eye could see. The Wildebeest were running in front of us for minutes as a time and then across the plains and back again. Just hope Heather and Nick we will see the same. Once out of the park, we took a day to just cool off and make notes and acknowledge how lucky we were to be able to spend this time and able to still afford this wonderful experience.
2nd – 3rd July.
Spent two nights at Mwanza on Lake Victoria at the Mwanza Yacht club. Had a couple of meals out, including another “Fresh Chicken”, met some super SA men who were playing squash, and gave us a good supermarket to shop in, and a pizza place for a meal. Really good but really pricey. Wolf had broken his glasses and after a run around of directions, got a new frame for R120.00. Had my spare pair which I broke, at the hot springs, (had too much too drink and fell in the pool) fixed for nothing. Had a small repair to the car fixed at a Mitsubishi agent for a very reasonable price. (No invoice of course)
Left on the 4th July for Rwanda
Just a few additions.
In Tanzania, all speed bumps, and they have hundreds, especially through all the towns, some are one big, some are 5 small bumps, and some are just dreadful, they are called ‘SLEEPING POLICEMAN” and they work, they irritate the hell out of Wolfgang. The only good thing is they don’t give out fines. We did however manage to pick up one speeding fine, 45km in a 30km speed zone which “of coarse” Wolf did not see, so negotiated the fine with lots of s—t talking and laughing and the end result, Tanz. Shillings, 10,000 (R65.00)
Our highlights, all the parks,(even with the high costs) the lowlights lots of cold showers, some of the corrugated roads in the parks, and the campsite in Arusha was horrific.(Massai Campsite, not recommended)
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