After leaving Lake Manyara we drove up a significant “hill” to get to our hotel. The hotel is a bit old, but it sits on a cliff overlooking a 600+ meter drop into amazing. This image is from my patio.
Ngorongoro Crater is a 100 square mile (~260 sqKM) conservation area within an extinct volcanic caldera. Over the millennium animals have found their way into the caldera and the place is so ecological perfect they never need to leave. No kind of migration is required. It’s like the Hollywood cliche of a “lost paradise valley”.
We were in our vehicles 30 minutes before dawn the next morning and started our decent. The early-morning fog was a bit nervous, but we could see well enough as we entered the floor of the valley. We immediately saw two of the “big five” as an elephant and a cape buffalo were staring each other down. Unfortunately, they were in deep bush, so I did not have any decent pictures. However, this was quickly followed by a stalking lion.
The zebra spotted her, and the lion did not have a pride to support the hunt. Better luck next time.
I’m not going to bother trying to make the rest of this post chronological. It was a great day.
Lions. Lots of lions – mostly relaxing within sight of the dirt roads.
I’m including this picture just to show how little the lions care about the passing vehicles. She was less than 10m away from us, just taking a nap.
Enough lions, how about some lion food? Below are male and female Thomson’s gazelles.
And here are some Grant’s gazelles.
There are so many zebra and wildebeest here, and we expect to see them everywhere else – in far lager numbers. Here are some pictures to tide you over.
Let’s change it up and show some birds.
I don’t even know what this is, but they posed perfectly right next to the road. NEXT DAY EDIT – It is a Rufous-naped Lark.
Time for some grab-bag shots. There were a couple of times that a Black-Backed Jackal was spotted, but each time they were on the move in the bush. This is the best I could get.
There were many hippo, but this is the only one we found outside of the water.
Near the road were a family of olive baboon. Here a mother and many kids are searching for seeds and fruit.
This was an odd one. We stopped for several minutes waiting for the elephant to move before our guide realized he was napping.
Tomorrow we fly to the Serengeti for three nights. It’s a small plane, so we need to pack the minimum for the trip. Tauck gives us a small duffel bag for this.
Speaking of Tauck, here is the vehicle we are using. Twenty years ago I was in a Land Rover, but it seems the Toyota Land Cruiser has taken over. The fiberglass roof pops up to allow for elevated spotted while staying inside.
Hmmm, maybe I need to start a separate “Safari Boy” blog…