(Finally!!! I wrote this weeks and weeks ago and have, in Maun, Botswana, found a connection that is super quick! Hope you all enjoy... there is so much more to come!)
Today was just one big day of WOW. There are no other words for it. We were up at 0500 to get to Ngorogoro before sunrise and the view from the crater rim was just unbelievable and its difficult to describe but it was like looking down onto another world and I was left speechless.
The Ngorogoro Crater is part of the Great Rift Valley and used to be 4,500m high before it collapsed millions of years ago. The viewing point where we stopped was at 2,300m and the crater floor is approximately 700m below that.
There are dirt roads around the rim with only a few roads leading down through the dense scrub into the crater and we spent ½ a day driving round in there. We have so many great photos and saw lion, black rhino, flamingo, ostrich, buffalo, elephant, hippos, zebra and wildebeest to name a few and so many birds all within a very short space of time. The crater is absolutely teeming with wildlife and I’ve never seen anything like it, nor the numbers of animals in one place.
The water holes are the best viewing spots (obviously) and this one was no exception with loads of zebra milling around and jeez they’re a finicky bunch! Kicking, squealing, he-hawing, racing round and generally being picky with each other. The thwack as their hooves hit each other made me cringe.
The hippos were so entertaining. Mostly submerged, they would flick their ears or tails, blow bubbles from their noses and make funny farting noises. Exactly where this noise came from we couldn’t tell but it sure sounded funny, had us in stitches and we finally decided that farting couldn’t be ruled out. Some hippos were lying on their sides and one rolled right over completely, with his fat hippo legs stuck in the air.
The lake in the crater is a soda lake and the elephants make the long trek into the crater to drink the water. Giraffe aren’t found in the crater as their legs can’t handle the hills but elephants seem to have no qualms about using the roads. Apparently there are about 25,000 animals in the crater (which is about 20km across) and while they’re free to come and go, most stay as there is everything they need. There seemed to be 1000’s of flamingo in the lake but I think it was a bit of an optical illusion as when you looked closely it was the reflections that made it look like there were 1000s.
The sides of the crater are quite steep in places. The bush is also very dense and while there were tracks, you could forgive the animals for wanting to stay and not venture outside the crater walls.
After half a day in the crater we were all in awe but there was more to come as we headed to the Serengeti, just over the other side of the Rift Valley range. Two huge extremes. The Great Rift Valley is mountainous, fertile, green, cool and misty and the Serengeti, right on its doorstep, is flat, vast and incredibly dry and dusty. It seems to go on forever (apparently Serengeti means “endless plain”).
We were headed right into the middle of the Serengeti and had hours of bumping on rough dirt roads, dirt flying everywhere with not a hill in sight. Quite awesome really. It wasn’t windy but there were twisters appearing all over the place.
At first, there were no animals anywhere to be seen so we were settling in for a long haul along this dusty, bumpy flat flat track until we dived off the road to a waterhole. There were six young lions lazing round in the mud, waiting for mum to return with food presumably. Brilliant!
They were very cute, dirty and very lazy
They weren't doing much and we were about to head onwards but then along came a bird (you can see that all but one is looking at something in the first picture) and two of them got more interested so we hung around to watch thinking they’d make a run for the bird, but as it turned out they didn't even need to do that (the bird is in the bottom centre of the below photo but blends in nicely with the mud).
We couldn’t believe the bird could be so stupid and was even swiped at by the cub on the right but still carried on hopping merrily around the edge before he reached the green plants on the edge then got interested in something in there.
This cub was so interested and the bird completely lost track of what was going on
and before the bird knew it, something was moving in on him
and it was all over red rover, one paw was all it took
and the bird didn’t stand a chance
The cub tried to play with it but the bird just went to pieces – literally
and the feathers kept getting stuck in his mouth, I don’t think he liked it that much
We couldn’t quite believe what we’d seen and still couldn’t believe the bird thought he’d get away with it. Then we came across more hippos but these guys were slightly more active than the last.
and they were bumping around each other in the water and I think one of them had just had enough
These guys were just enormous and the fat on them (you can see the big neck roll on the one on the left). For big animals, they can move scarily fast.
It was a good time of year for young animals for sure – zebra foals, lion cubs, buffalo calves, hippo calves (I think they’re calves?), chicks and gazelle babies – not sure what you’d call them!
Our camp site for the night is right out in the open and when we arrived, there was a giraffe eating nearby.
With no fences to stop anything getting in, everyone crowded the tents close together and it was just too squished so we moved our tent to the outskirts which seemed fine in the daylight. After dark it was a different story and we wondered if moving was such a bright idea. This is the view from our tent and it was so hot that Euan wanted to sleep with the tent flaps up and just the mozzie mesh but I wasn’t having a bar of it. No way. I felt too exposed with three sides of the tent open. Once I pointed out that the noise we could hear were hyena laughing, he changed his mind and the flaps came down quick smart although Euan still didn’t understand my logic of feeling safe as long as I couldn’t see anything.
The Ngorogoro Crater is part of the Great Rift Valley and used to be 4,500m high before it collapsed millions of years ago. The viewing point where we stopped was at 2,300m and the crater floor is approximately 700m below that.
There are dirt roads around the rim with only a few roads leading down through the dense scrub into the crater and we spent ½ a day driving round in there. We have so many great photos and saw lion, black rhino, flamingo, ostrich, buffalo, elephant, hippos, zebra and wildebeest to name a few and so many birds all within a very short space of time. The crater is absolutely teeming with wildlife and I’ve never seen anything like it, nor the numbers of animals in one place.
The water holes are the best viewing spots (obviously) and this one was no exception with loads of zebra milling around and jeez they’re a finicky bunch! Kicking, squealing, he-hawing, racing round and generally being picky with each other. The thwack as their hooves hit each other made me cringe.
The hippos were so entertaining. Mostly submerged, they would flick their ears or tails, blow bubbles from their noses and make funny farting noises. Exactly where this noise came from we couldn’t tell but it sure sounded funny, had us in stitches and we finally decided that farting couldn’t be ruled out. Some hippos were lying on their sides and one rolled right over completely, with his fat hippo legs stuck in the air.
The lake in the crater is a soda lake and the elephants make the long trek into the crater to drink the water. Giraffe aren’t found in the crater as their legs can’t handle the hills but elephants seem to have no qualms about using the roads. Apparently there are about 25,000 animals in the crater (which is about 20km across) and while they’re free to come and go, most stay as there is everything they need. There seemed to be 1000’s of flamingo in the lake but I think it was a bit of an optical illusion as when you looked closely it was the reflections that made it look like there were 1000s.
The sides of the crater are quite steep in places. The bush is also very dense and while there were tracks, you could forgive the animals for wanting to stay and not venture outside the crater walls.
After half a day in the crater we were all in awe but there was more to come as we headed to the Serengeti, just over the other side of the Rift Valley range. Two huge extremes. The Great Rift Valley is mountainous, fertile, green, cool and misty and the Serengeti, right on its doorstep, is flat, vast and incredibly dry and dusty. It seems to go on forever (apparently Serengeti means “endless plain”).
We were headed right into the middle of the Serengeti and had hours of bumping on rough dirt roads, dirt flying everywhere with not a hill in sight. Quite awesome really. It wasn’t windy but there were twisters appearing all over the place.
At first, there were no animals anywhere to be seen so we were settling in for a long haul along this dusty, bumpy flat flat track until we dived off the road to a waterhole. There were six young lions lazing round in the mud, waiting for mum to return with food presumably. Brilliant!
They were very cute, dirty and very lazy
They weren't doing much and we were about to head onwards but then along came a bird (you can see that all but one is looking at something in the first picture) and two of them got more interested so we hung around to watch thinking they’d make a run for the bird, but as it turned out they didn't even need to do that (the bird is in the bottom centre of the below photo but blends in nicely with the mud).
We couldn’t believe the bird could be so stupid and was even swiped at by the cub on the right but still carried on hopping merrily around the edge before he reached the green plants on the edge then got interested in something in there.
This cub was so interested and the bird completely lost track of what was going on
and before the bird knew it, something was moving in on him
and it was all over red rover, one paw was all it took
and the bird didn’t stand a chance
The cub tried to play with it but the bird just went to pieces – literally
and the feathers kept getting stuck in his mouth, I don’t think he liked it that much
We couldn’t quite believe what we’d seen and still couldn’t believe the bird thought he’d get away with it. Then we came across more hippos but these guys were slightly more active than the last.
and they were bumping around each other in the water and I think one of them had just had enough
These guys were just enormous and the fat on them (you can see the big neck roll on the one on the left). For big animals, they can move scarily fast.
It was a good time of year for young animals for sure – zebra foals, lion cubs, buffalo calves, hippo calves (I think they’re calves?), chicks and gazelle babies – not sure what you’d call them!
Our camp site for the night is right out in the open and when we arrived, there was a giraffe eating nearby.
With no fences to stop anything getting in, everyone crowded the tents close together and it was just too squished so we moved our tent to the outskirts which seemed fine in the daylight. After dark it was a different story and we wondered if moving was such a bright idea. This is the view from our tent and it was so hot that Euan wanted to sleep with the tent flaps up and just the mozzie mesh but I wasn’t having a bar of it. No way. I felt too exposed with three sides of the tent open. Once I pointed out that the noise we could hear were hyena laughing, he changed his mind and the flaps came down quick smart although Euan still didn’t understand my logic of feeling safe as long as I couldn’t see anything.
1 comment:
Hilarious. You 2 make me wet myself sometimes. I have to agree with Euan, closing the tent flaps is probably as usefull as sticking your head in the ground..... If a lion walks by and wants you.... yum yum.
Anyhow, looks like you got to see the big 5. lucky you. Am glad your stories are back on the net.
Ladi
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