Tanzanian Safari

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Lake Manyara is a 3 hours drive from Moshi along fairly good roads. The park is 330 sq km of which 70% is the actual lake. This alkaline, fresh water lake attracts over 400 species of birds and numerous African animals. The western boundary is also the Great Rift Valley’s western wall. Lake Manyara hotel, where we will be staying, is located on this wall overlooking the whole national park. After 7 days in a tent, this lodge is like luxury. We enter the park about 4pm and drive around for 3 hours, the highlight is the hippo pool where sightings are guaranteed as hippos don’t usually leave the water in the day time. There are many lounging around in the shallow pool surrounding by the plains full of wildebeest, zebra, numerous species of antelope and water birds. On the exit of the park we see an elephant calf with mother, it stops in the path and we have to make noise to scare it into the bush, I am nervous the mother may ram us! We leave the park safely and then drive up the rift wall to reach our hotel perched on the cliff side. Amazing comfort to have en-suite room, full buffet dinner and traditional African entertainment, after 7 days on a mountain side.

There are approximately 1 million people of the Maasai tribe living in Kenyan and Northern Tanzania. They live a semi-nomadic lifestyle, living in circular mud huts built by the women of the group. Maasai have been given the right to live on any land within Kenya and Tanzania including the national parks but are supposed to follow national law. The roaming is seasonal rotational for the livestock which are herded by the boys and men of the group. The group hierarchy consists of boys herding goats, young elders herding larger cattle and elders guiding and managing the group. The Maasai men are polygamous and each wife has their own hut for themselves and their children, this practice is aided by the uneven population distribution between men and women.
Between Lake Manyara and the Serengeti, there are many maasai villages, some open their doors to tourists for extra income and to share the secrets of their traditional culture. We stop at one and get a brief history of their lives and culture by the most educated boy of the village, he has been to school in the town and hopes to use his knowledge to help his village. We visit one of the traditional huts, which are dark and smoky. We also visit the village kindergarten where all the small children recite the roman alphabet for us and then sing a local song. The local women dress us in huge necklaces and we then sing and dance with them, the boys enter a jumping dance/competition with the boys of the village. The jumping dance is very important to the Maasai, the warriors can jump to waist height which is amazing when you watch the westerners barely reaching a few inches.

We stop at the Olduvai gorge, an important prehistoric site where human evolution was researched in the 50s. Many fossils have been excavated and a footprint set was found in the volcanic ash covered land.

We continue on to the Serengeti, the weather slightly dampens our excitement as it doesn't look as we'd imagined in the cloudy setting. We were expecting a sun lit desert wilderness. It is an amazing expanse of land though, about 30,000km2. The rules are quite strict in this national park and the jeeps are only allowed on the dirt track paths, only straying occasionally to get round other jeeps. This helps us to see wildlife though as the animals are not scared of the vehicles, like they seem to be in the Maasai Mara, so come closer to the tracks and we get very close up viewing. We keep our expectations low to prevent disappointment but do get slightly excited every time Frede, all our guides have the same names!, gets on his VHF radio talking Swahili to the other jeep drivers. I have bought a guide to wildlife at the visitor centre so we look up the names of the big 5 in Swahili in case we can make it out in the crackling radio chat. Of course we already know lion, Simba, if only the rest of the lion king was swahili! We have already seen Timon and Pumba but those are not correct translations 😞 We see many more antelope and lots of birds which is when I seem to be the only one interested. It must be being brought up in the sticks, you get used to seeing so many birds so then when they are all different it is interesting, especially when they are huge eagles and vultures. Suddenly we start a dash and are one of the first jeeps on the scene, there is a male lion just lazing in the grass only a few metres from the track edge. We have an amazing view as he sits and assesses the savannah. Eventually he walks through the jeeps, ignoring all of us, to his female waiting in the long grass. An amazing sight which makes our day. We continue to see hippos, babboons, giraffes and elephants, they start to become dull!! We have now seen 3 of the big 5 though, Buffalo, Lion and Elephant. Leopard and Rhino are the rarest so we don't expect sightings of these.
The second day brings many of the same sights, but an added extra is a cheetah feeding on a recent kill. Cheetahs have a tough life as they have the speed and agility to catch their dinner but then they have to eat fast before it gets stolen. A vulture will see the kill and then start a call to alert other vultures and more importantly hyenas. The cheetah can't fight these off once they appear so he eats fast, gets all that he can, then leaves the barely touch carcass for the scavengers. Pretty unfair as he did all the work to catch the dinner! This can also be dangerous if it has been a tough chase as the cheetah needs recovery time after reaching such speeds.

After spending 2 days in the Serengeti and seeing hundreds of wild animals we start the journey back towards Moshi to the Ngorongoro Crater, a different terrain brings slightly different animals. But one last amazing sight before we leave, 2 female lions with their 6 cubs, just ambling down the dirt track, they don't seem to mind us following them and then passing at all!
The Ngorongoro crater is not only a different environment but also keeps the animals more contained so aids with viewing. We are in the season for the annual wildebeest migration, where about 2 million herbivores leave Tanzania and trek to the Maasai Mara in Kenya, most of which are wildebeest, they don't need passports! The crater has thousands of wildebeest and zebra, we can even get out of the jeep at this point to get a closer look, they are still wild animals of course though so not close enough to touch. There are few routes inside the crater and many water sources so we get to see many animals and birds drinking. We see many more lions, the count is now up to 19! Unbelievable! As we stop to see another hippo pool which also has many water birds we keep a careful watch behind us where the large animals are grazing, just in case. Lucky we did as someone spots a cheetah prowling in the long grass, he sees his chance and goes for it, we suddenly see the full power of a cheetah as it races across the savannah, unfortunately it runs so far, so quickly, we don't get to see if it has caught it's prey.
Frede performs again and somehow sees a black rhino in the distance, they are very shy animals so we never get a chance to see it closer, but we are glad to get number 4 checked off the list.
The drive out of the crater attracts a troop of baboons, many stop for some sex along the way and many are already carrying babies. We also see many Maasai with their cattle, they bring their herds in and out of the crater for water, multiple times a day. The Maasai can walk for miles a day without a problem, this is a skill of the nomadic lifestyle. The hotel is once again amazing, built in the 60s so dated decor but perched on the crater edge with telescopes on the restaurant veranda for stunning views of the grazing herds. We can see almost all the large animals from the comfort of the bar!
The safari is over, but it has been amazing. 5 days is just enough to still find the wildlife interesting and not be bored. 8 hours a day, on bumpy roads, watching sometimes empty stretches of land can take its toll but one glimpse of a large cat makes it all worth it.

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