Tanzania - Week Two

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Hi everyone!
I realised I hadn't made Tanzania sounds as EXCITING as it is in the last blog, so this time I'll try harder.

Day 9 -
Today we woke up at 6am to go to the national parks in Tanzania! We were picked up by the company 'Bright Visit Adventures' (recommended by The Leap) who took us and two other girls, Alice and Kate, to the Serengeti National Park. This was a 4/5 hour journey, however they took us down the Great Rift Valley, past Lake Manyara and through Ngorongoro Conservation Area to get there, so there were plenty of beautiful views to take in along the way, and some animals too!
Alice and Kate are medical students from Nottingham University and as part of an elective they are volunteering at a hospital in Arusha!
We had a game drive in the Serengeti National Park and saw the following animals;
Lions, elephants, leopards, cheetahs, antelopes, gazelles, mongooses (mongeese?), meerkats, zebras, buffalos, hippos and dik diks (a tanzanian deer-like creature!) We got some really close up pictures of them, the animals seemed unphased by the massive jeep and often came over to lie in the shade of the jeep - quite scary when it's a fully grown male lion!
After our game drive we went to our campsite called the Dik Dik Campsite. Camping is quite fun in the national park - it is right in the middle and is completely open - inviting all the animals to come join the party! We saw antelope and wilderbeasts fairly near, and there may have been animals roaming around in the night but I didn't notice (those who know me know that I am a very heavy sleeper!) However, I did notice the amount of creepy crawlies there were around - even having my first encounter with a cockroach... Mmm! We were advised not to keep any food in our tents and not to leave our tents at night (not even for a toilet run) as who knows what we could encounter!

Day 10 -
We arose at the horrific time of 5.45am (3.45am in England!) and watched the sun rise which was beautiful!
We then set off for a morning game drive in the Serengeti, however, we did not manage to see many animals (I think they were all having a lie-in, I was very jealous at this point!) Also, because we were so lucky the day before I did not mind them not wanting to come out again for us!
We went back to the campsite for brunch and then set off for Ngorongoro! We arrived at our aptly named campsite Simba Campsite (Simba in Swahili means lion!) We also noticed a lot of warthogs around - which are called Pumbas in Swahili (makers of the Lion King were not very imaginative it seems!) Upon arriving at the campsite we noticed we had a visitor! A fully grown male elephant was just taking a stroll through our campsite! In this campsite we were also told about the frequent visitors of bush pigs - who have a habit of finding a way into your tent so not keeping food in there was especially important!

Day 11 -
We once again arose with the sun - feeling quite pastoral and natural, waking up with the sun! (This is why forgetting a torch was a fatal error - getting reading in a tent in pitch black is not easy!) We then descended into the Ngorongoro crater which was beautiful - really amazing. Once again, we saw so many animals so up close. The only animals (that I can remember - so many!) that we had not yet seen was the rhino and flamingoes. Unfortunately, we only got to see these animals from a distance. Flamingoes were in the water, which there is no road for the jeep to get near to them, and the rhinos are solitary animals who are very secretive so hardly come close to the roads.
Afterwards, we drove back to Arusha and had a well deserved shower! (It is very dusty there and no amount of baby wipes in the world can take get it off!)

Day 12 -
Today we had a lie in (until 6am English time!) and went to our placement at Camp Joshua to continue with the building of a fence wall.
Before today we had dug the foundation and put the rocks in to begin the construction. Next, we were to dig the soil back into the foundation, then put water over it, create cement and then lay the bricks. We had taught English in the morning and so only began to dig the soil at midday - Worst. Decision. Ever. It is meant to be rain season here but I haven't seen rain in a week so the midday sun is roasting! Mbasa has promised my skin will adapt to the sun, but it is putting up a fight! Also - wearing a grey top was a really bad idea! After placement we came back for a shower (we were covered in soil, I was beginning to look like a local!) and took the dalla dalla (reminder: a dalla dalla is an RV type vehicle crammed with people that take you into city centres for very little money) by ourselves - quite daunting and we are yet to be completely comfortable with where everything is! But we found everything ok and made it back in one piece!

Day 13 -
Today we went back to Camp Joshua and decided to do the construction work first as it was quite cloudy (still boiling!) Mbasa claims that it isn't hot (he was wearing a hoody throughout whilst we were sweating!) and told us the Dar es Salaam is much hotter, so let's just hope I get used to the heat! (Thanking my heat-resistant gene pool I emerged from!) We were dragging buckets of water up from a well (remind me never to fall down one of those terrifying things) and walking across the campus (which seems massive when you are carrying heavy buckets of water!)
Then we gathered the sand and gravel to make the cement (which was also quite strenuous - I am not a fan of digging!)
And that takes me up to here!

Hope you have enjoyed reading as much as I have enjoyed experiencing.
Homework assignment: Can someone please investigate why cows here have humps? Tanzanians don't seem to know the answer - they did not know that cows in England are humpless!

Lots of love,
Beki xxx

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