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Published: September 30th 2006
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Hey, hey we're tumbili!
With Kurt, Mike, Erin and Steve prior to departure. After a long drive through Kenya we crossed the border into Tanzania and headed for Arusha. Another beautiful sunset from the truck meant we again reached camp after dark. This meant pitching our tents for the first time without being able to see what we were doing. Fortunately, the new additions to our tour had just returned from a fortnight’s camping to see gorillas in the Congo, and were more than willing to help out us newbies. Little did we know that this was going to be the least of our worries…
At about 10:30pm most people started to feel some stomach pains. Sitting in the bar, smiles started to fade and people began to leave. The rest of the night was spent with most people suffering from cramps, diarrhoea, and even vomiting (which was amusingly eaten by wild dogs). So this is why they printed in our joining instructions that everyone
will get sick in Africa!
We got up at 6am - at the time we considered this ridiculously early, not realising that in the weeks to come that would be considered a sleep-in! - and everyone looked really rough, with only Kurt managing to avoid the “bug”
and go for our planned sunrise jog.
Most of us were too green to manage anything more than toast for breakfast. We had each packed a daypack to last us for the next 3 days. The closest we’d come to a shower was a pack of wet-wipes. At least we’d all stink together.
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We divided into groups of 5 or 6 to jump into 4WDs. We chose our vehicle - “Tumbili” which means monkey in Swahili - based on the legroom and it proved a wise choice. After the last twelve hours we’d all endured, karma owed us big-time, and we were treated to an amazing game drive through the Serengeti.
We had a close-up drive with an elephant, saw cheetah lounging in the sun, watched a few lionesses try to catch a warthog and stuff it up, then attempt to save face by pouncing on some guinea fowl and even missing them! Finally we ended with a sunset behind an acacia tree with a beautiful leopard lounging over the branches.
Our bush camp was just that: a camp in the middle of the bush. No running water. No fences. No electricity. Truly back
Then Mike shows him how it's done
This kid was so cute, pulling Jackie Chan poses and running around. to nature. We fell asleep to the sounds of wild animals around us.
Another ricoculously (thanks to Mike for the superlative to ridiculous!) early start and we were in the 4WD by 6:30 for a dawn game drive. The roof of the vehicle came off and we were able to watch the wildlife with our heads poking out the top, looking not unlike meercats.
Our highlights for the day included:
- An elephant shag
- A second near-miss (well, near-kill would be more accurate) involving a cheetah and a gazelle
- Lots of cute baby giraffe and elephants
We left the dusty, dusty Serengeti and headed back to the crater rim, stopping en route to uproot a dead tree for firewood. It was our first time arriving at camp in daylight which allowed us to see what we were doing while setting up our tents (novelty!). The campsite was in a stunning setting, but at almost 2000m above sea level it proved to be a very cold night.
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Our third day without a shower arrived, and strangely, it didn’t bother us nearly as must as we thought it would. Wet wipes are the new best friend
for the whole group.
We awoke to a freezing cold morning on the rim of the crater. What we at first thought was mist in fact turned out to be clouds that we were in the midst of. The descent into the crater was breathtaking, with sun streaming through the clouds as we descended into the valley. We were greeted immediately by a fresh lion kill surrounded by lots of hyena, and this set the tone for an amazing day.
On a curious side note: we came to the conclusion that we were animal aphrodisiacs, as everywhere we went animals seemed to shag (or attempt it). Or maybe it was just that it was Spring. In any case, we saw baboons, elephants, ostriches and lions going at it (not all together, obviously).
We’ll let our photos show you a selection of the animals we saw. We’d like to say a HUGE thank you to Jacs at this stage. The untimely demise of our digital camera on the first day of our trip could have been disastrous, but she graciously offered us copies of her photos, and as you can see, she’s a fantastic photographer. Almost all the
A bunch of lions
and Bronson popping out the top of our 4WD. wildlife photos from the Masai Mara and Serengeti were taken by her. THANKS JACS!!
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Meg
non-member comment
LOL - Tummy bugs
LOl re tummy bugs. I can empathise! Glad to hear all is well and that your animal instinct is making the locals wild. Love from thursday island, Meg xoxo