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Published: October 29th 2007
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Baby Elephant at Lake Manyara
The baby is nursing. Elephants have axial mammary glands...go figure. I thought they would be like cows. It’s Monday evening and we returned from safari on Friday. We were looking forward to the chance to get away for a few days. Our driver picked us up on Monday morning precisely at 8:30. Our driver and guide Alfred looked to be in his mid to late twenties and he was from the Chonga tribe by Mt. Kilimanjaro. He spoke English very well, was very well informed, was very polite and had a good sense of humor. I didn’t know that credit cards here are hardly ever used. All transactions are in cash including large purchases like a safari. I had to go to Arusha three times to three or more ATMs to withdraw enough cash to pay for our safari.
It was amazing getting out of Arusha and seeing how beautiful the country side here really is. Arusha is a big dust bowl. Alfred told us that the city has doubled its population in the last few years to over a million people. “Everyone is coming to Arusha to find a better life,” he said. The infrastructure is showing signs of wear with a population increase that dramatic. I said to Anne that I was so glad we
Dik Dik
Yes its name is Dik Dik. They are very small and hard to find. left the Arusha area just so we wouldn’t leave Africa with the impression that it was all like Arusha.
We passed many small towns many with souvenir stands. Also we passed Masai villages and Masai people who wear the most beautiful and brightly colored robes. We arrived at Lake Manayara for our first safari ride. Just inside the gate we passed a group of baboons. Some of the females were carrying their young who would hang under their bellies or on their backs. One particular female had what appeared to be a very recently born baby. The eyes were barely opened. She sat down just in front of the car and began nursing her baby. We drove just a half kilometer further and spotted a lone male elephant feeding on a tree next to the road. He didn’t even seemed startled that we were there. We saw many other animals at Lake Manyara including giraffes, impalas, zebras, cape buffalo and hippos. At one point we were driving down the trail and coming towards us were a dozen elephants including males, females, adolescents and newborns. One of the females let her baby nurse right at the side of our vehicle.
Giraffe at Lake Manyara
The giraffe is the national symbol of Tanzania. In Swahili the giraffe is "Twiga" It was amazing. I learned that elephants have axial mammary glands just like humans.
We left for our first lodge stay just 30 kilometers from the park entrance. We went through a small town named Karatu and down a dirt road that looked worn with poverty. We turned into the gate of the lodge and were welcomed with lovely gardens and staff willing to help in any way. Two women carried our bags to a cottage in the garden. Our room had three poster beds with mosquito net canopies. It was very lovely. The meal was fantastic, something my father would love…roast pork and sour red cabbage. I felt a tinge of guilt leaving in the morning and seeing the poverty just outside the wall.
We left that morning for the Serengeti. To get there the safari vehicles have to travel through the Ngorongoro Highlands on an unpaved road for 190 kilometers. Ngorongoro Crater Park would be our last stop after the Serengeti. After Alfred purchased the park entrance passes we began the relentless journey to the Serengeti. We drove up, up, up to the top of the Great Rift Valley ridge that Alfred told us began in
The Crater Rim
This was our first view of the Ngorongoro Crater Jordon and ended in South Africa. When we reached the top we stopped to view the crater that was formed when the volcano floor collapsed and after it erupted many millions of years ago. The site of the crater was amazing. I was literally unprepared for its magnitude. It reminded me of the feeling I had the first time I saw the Grand Canyon. I had no idea something that big and that beautiful existed in Tanzania. We left for the Serengeti looking forward to visiting the crater floor in a few days.
The trip to the Serengeti was very hard. The road was long and very bumpy. Our travel guide suggested for visits to the Serengeti to arrange to fly at least one way. We didn’t take the advice for financial reasons and regretted it later. On the way we stopped in a Masai village that allows tourists to stop and take pictures for a fee. I had asked Alfred if I could take pictures of people on the side of the road and he suggested against it. He said that many people don’t like to have their picture taken and have resorted to stoning the vehicles where
Olivia Dances with the Masaai
Olivia Dances with the Masaai they do. The fee to visit the Masai village was $70, an enormous sum considering the average earnings in Tanzania. They danced a welcome dance for us and asked us to join in. Anne and Olivia danced with the women and I danced with the men. The smell at the village was horrible. It smelled of urine, smoke and BO. We were invited to come inside one of their homes or domas. The doorway was about a meter high and a half meter across. The roof was very low so that there was no way to stand upright inside. The chief who was guiding us emptied the doma and explained that their houses were made from cow manure, mud and water to form a plaster that is spread on the branches of Acadia trees. There was a fire for cooking that made the inside very warm. There were no windows and it was very dark. We realized after ten minutes that there was someone in the doma with us. In the back was a young woman nursing a baby that couldn’t leave when the chief invited us in. I felt very uncomfortable. It seemed intrusive. After the doma visit we were invited to “browse” in their market. As we walked out we were surrounded by Masai women trying to put beaded jewelry on us. We bought a few things mostly out of courtesy but they started high and didn’t barter as low as we had wanted. All in all we spent a lot of money to feel uncomfortable and out of place in a village that smelled very bad and covered us from head to toe in dust.
We continued on the road to the Serengeti. Our destination was in the middle of the park for ease in viewing all the parts. On the way we saw gazelles, more gazelles, and more gazelles, and still even more gazelles. The Serengeti Plain is very flat and seems to go on endlessly. By the time we reached our destination I was sure that I wasn’t going to like the Serengeti half as much as I enjoyed Lake Manyara.
To be continued...
If you want to see more pictures I have more saved on Facebook. The link to the album is http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=11062&id=721091450. It is public so you don't have to belong to Facebook to see it.
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robin
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what an adventure!
Hi! I'm just catching up on your adventures. I'm sure I would have absolutely hated that ride to the Serengeti (i.e. motion sickness, etc) but I'm guessing that the arduous trip was worth it . . .