Monday November 17 2008

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Monday November 17 2008

SERNGETI!!

What a treat this was! We left the hotel at 5:00 AM, in order to arrive at 7:00 when the gates open. It promised to be a great day … little did we know! Me and my stolen roll of toilet paper were off!!

As soon as we got inside the Park we were met by all kinds of monkeys. We carried on and throughout the day saw Wildebeest, Zebras, hippos, corcs, hyenas, girrafes, elephants, lions, lizards, jackals, cranes, huge birds that look like eagles, gazelles, dik diks, Impalas, Topi’s, and water buffalos. (http://www.iserengeti.com/african-animals.html) It was amazing … the lions got within 10 feet of the jeep we were in. The roof on the jeep lifted up so that we could stand and see out. We followed a family of giraffes along the one road for quite some time. The little one would kick up it’s heels and take a quick run ahead, turn around and come back. Then one decided to stop and get a drink; that is quite a sight to see as they position their front legs so that they can reach the puddle.
The elephants had crossed the main road a couple of hours before we got there so we only saw them from a distance. We managed to get to see one slow poke, but by the time we saw him he was quite a ways off. Nonetheless we got some good pictures.
I made many “pit stops” throughout the day, one in particular was near a river, I just started my work when a hippo decided to let out this huge roar (not sure what he was roaring about??) it scared the _______ out of me!!!

Our tour guide was pretty good, he seemed to know where to go, we seldom saw other vehicles and we seemed to see quite a few animals. The bad part was we got stuck twice. I mentioned that the rainy season had started, well here it comes a bit earlier … there was mud holes everywhere. The definition of insanity is to repeat the same process ver and over and yet expect a different outcome. Well our driver has never heard of this … we managed to get ourselves out only for him to decide to do the same route all over again. It took over 2 hours and many Rangers to get us out!!! At one point the guide suggested we walk to some nearby bush to get some sticks etc to out under the wheels … I must have been sick, we got into this thicket only to realize we were in The Serengeti, this is where wild animals live, this is not one of the Ontario Provincial Parks I was walking through, I tell ya, it was a quick trip back to the Jeep which was about 150 yards away!!!
The trip took a quick death after that, we had seen all the animals we came to see and we were exhausted from trying to get this jeep out of the mud.

We got back at 6:30, had some supper (toast) and called it a night!!

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