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Published: October 4th 2016
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Watering Hole
Zebras & Wildebeest Our first safari stop was
Tarangire National Park; after meeting our guide, Selemani, in Arusha, we hopped in the truck and made our way to the park arriving in the early afternoon. While Selemani registered our visit we wandered the gate entrance and spotted our first animals; they included mongoose and vervet monkeys who likely would have loved a few treats from us.
Jumping back into the truck we experienced our first game drive. Within minutes we saw numerous impala, zebra and ostrich. The animals littered the landscape, a trend that continued in all the parks we visited. Tarangire is a great park to start with as the animals are abundant and the environment and landscape is spectacular. Tarangire provided our first up close experience with a herd of elephants. We found them devouring entire acacia trees. They were only about 15 feet from the truck and we could have spent hours watching them. It's easy to tell when elephants have been in the area as you'll see a number of broken down and bare trees. So why don't you have to worry about all of the trees being consumed by elephants? They take care of replanting them themselves. Some of what
goes in must come out... and when one of the elephants decided to give us a close up view of the process, we decided to move on.
Giraffe and wildebeest were also there in good supply. Just watching all these animals mix and mingle together was both an exciting and magical way to start our safari. Giraffes especially became one of our favorites. They way they move, the way they look, and just their overall aura seems like you stepped back 100's of thousands years in time.
The landscape at this park is littered with giant Baobab trees. These enormous trees average a lifespan of 600 years! But some have been dated to be older than that...1000+ years!! After a century they have trunks that are about 10 meters in circumference. And as they are generally hollow inside you frequently come upon one that has a huge "entrance" cut in to it's trunk (these entrances are created by elephants eating the wood to get moisture). On our second day in Tarangire, Selemani stopped the truck at one of these massive trees, and after checking for inhabitants (there weren't any) he urged us inside. It was like
being in a tiny hut or cave. A very cool experience.
One of the major highlights in this park was our first experience with a Cheetah. Wow is that a beautiful cat! She was lying in the shade of a small tree and just a few feet from her was her baby cub (kitten?). She lazed about as our truck and 6 or 7 other trucks carrying tourists taking endless amounts of pictures (we fit in nicely as we're returning home with over 1000 photos - not just of the cheetah!).
We stayed for 2 nights at the
Tarangire Simba Camp. It is a permanent tented camp just outside the park gates. The "rooms" are tents....which are bigger than any hotel room you've ever seen. They run on solar power and occupy a stunning landscape.
The tents are canvas walled but luxurious. They include an outdoor shower, electrical outlets, lighting, four post bed, an electric safe, a veranda, and large meshed windows (yeah we were slumming it). Showering outside under the stars is a pretty awesome experience. The camp is not fenced and you are required to have escorts after dark if you
Home away from home
Our room at Tarangire Simba Camp want to move around from your tent to the bar, restaurant, pool, etc. And because it is not fenced we were visited by elephant, zebras and giraffes while eating, swimming and enjoying sundowners on the patio.
It was the only tented camp we stayed in on our safari but it was definitely one of our favourite experiences and one we would highly recommend.
More pics below!
Stay tuned...up next is Lake Manyara!
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