Africa Part X: Ngorongoro Crater - Award for Least Descriptive

Last stop.  I really should have finished this whole series months or at least weeks ago before I got back to school.  This post is going to be of the minimalist variety.

Our last stop on our African adventure was to the Ngorongoro Crater. 

We saw lots of ostriches.

We saw lots of zebras.

We saw lots of wildebeests.

We saw several crested cranes.

And we saw a few Red-Headed Agama Lizards - which are very entertaining when they are trying to mate.

Finally, Amelia and I started thinking about where to go next.

There!  It's done!  There is more to share, but really, I've just got to move on to the next things.  Really.

More pictures at flickr.

--Sarah--

Africa IX: Serengeti: Lions, Lions, and Lions - Oh My!

(Still having issues with loading pictures and videos and with formatting in general. Not sure if it is a blogger thing or an issue I am having while I am over here.) I switched back to the old version of Blogger so I can upload videos again!

After our brief stop at the Ngorongoro Crater, we arrived at the Serengeti National Park. The number of lions we saw here blew us away. I think one fellow traveler counted 60 over the three days we were here.

This lioness has a collar because she is being tracked. She was our first up-close lioness. We were very excited. She was right outside my window!

We were able to see a group of about 15 lion cubs sitting on a hill waiting for their moms to return from hunting. We were told that seeing this many cubs is very unusual.

We saw some lionesses hanging out on a rock.

We saw a lioness stalking her prey.... but the prey got away. It jumped up and ran away just as another vehicle arrived. I think the lioness looked right at the vehicle, annoyed at her loss of food.

I have a video of it as well, but it seems that blogger has removed that option. You can go here to see the video of the lioness hunting or just watch it here now that I can upload video again.

You can also see a video of two smaller elephants pushing this big elephant - here.

This lion reminded me of Aslan.

This picture gives you an idea of just how close we really were to the lions. This is a picture of another vehicle in our group.

We saw some Maasai rock paintings. I especially like the bicycle, or maybe it is a skateboard.

Amelia and I played around a bit when we stole our guide's machete.

It was sometimes chilly in the mornings on the Serengeti game drives.

We had some close calls in the vehicles again.

Mom was a good spotter.

After a day of driving and game drives, we were all tired.... even the lionesses.

Each day, when we thought about what we had seen and what we were experiencing, we thought about how lucky we were to be on the trip. We thought each day that it could not possibly get better or more amazing. Each day it did!

More pictures at flickr.

--Sarah--

P.S. Can you tell I am running out of steam on my Africa posts? One more. I can do it!

Africa Part VIII: Tarangire National Park and Olduvai Gorge

So, it looks like my emailed blog post worked did not work.  I can't couldn't see the photos but I can could see a little blue square indicating that there is a photo there that is blocked by The Man.  Apparently that is what was visible to everyone else as well.  Hopefully everything looks the way it looked to me when I emailed it.  I can get to my blog at school, but I want to get caught up because there are more current things I'd like to blog about!

After leaving Amboseli, we drove to the border to enter Tanzania.  Most of our group had already applied for and received our visas before we left the U.S., so we waited in lines to get stamped and then got back on the bus.  One person had not been able to get her visa before leaving, but everything went smoothly and I think she waited the least amount of time in the end.  We said goodbye to our Kenyan guide, Joe, before entering Tanzania.

My first impression of Tanzania was that it was much drier and dustier than the places we had visited in Kenya.  The Maasai homes were built using different materials and different construction.  The ones in Kenya had a flat roof while the ones in Tanzania were more cylindrical with a thicker, pointed roof.

Here's Kenya first and Tanzania second.

In Tarangire National Park, we saw a lot of baboons, zebras, elephants, and giraffes.

Sometimes the giraffes tried to hide from us.

We usually found them still.  Look!  Twiga!

The elephants, of course, were my favorite.  We caught an early morning scratch and stretch one day.

Some were content munching on the plants.

Some looked a little like they might want to charge at us if we got any closer.

Tarangire National Park was much more forest-like than the other parks.  There was a river, which we drove through at one point.  We took an off-road route to our lodge because it was a shortcut unavailable during the wet season.  Thank goodness for guides.  I don't think we saw a single sign on the way.

When we arrived in the Tarangire National Park, we got our first sightings of the very interesting Baobab Tree.  These trees are huge and so interesting in a creepy-looking way.  As you can imagine, there are all sorts of stories about spirits living in the trees, etc.

 

 

Tarangire was beautiful.

On the way to the Serengeti, we stopped by the Olduvai Gorge, the "Cradle of Mankind", and looked around.

(My archaeologist father would probably not want me to leave it at that, but this was back in July and I want to get on with the posts of now.  So, I'll let you look here and find out more information on the Olduvai Gorge yourself.  Sorry, Dad.)

We drove by the Ngorongoro Crater as well.  This time, we had just a brief stop before heading to the Serengeti.  After visiting the Serengeti, we returned to the Crater for a couple of days.  I'll include those pictures when I post about that part of the trip.

(I am not liking the new formatting for blogspot.  It won't let me put my photos where I want them.  I have only a short time before I need to go home where blogspot is blocked so this is how it stays.)

--Sarah--

Africa Part VII: Amboseli - Land of Death and Babies

Our next stop after the Maasai Mara was Amboseli National Park in southern Kenya. On our way, we saw a Gerenuk or Giraffe-necked Antelope. This animal will stand up on its hind legs and stretch out its long neck to reach leaves like the giraffe. I only got a good picture of it sitting under this tree though.

From Amboseli, we had fantastic views of Mount Kilimanjaro.

Amboseli was much more arid than the parks we had been to so far and we saw many more carcasses of animals that died or were killed during their migration. While this was sad to see, we kept the circle of life in mind as we saw the vultures feasting on the recently deceased.

Amboseli National Park is where Echo the Elephant lived. She is maybe the most famous wild elephant and was featured in BBC documentaries: Echo of the Elephants; Echo of the Elephants, The Next Generation; and Echo of the Elephants, The Final Chapter. Echo died May 2009, so we were unfortunately not able to see her leading her family. We did see her final resting spot and there were still elephants nearby. Echo was the matriarch of her family for at least 36 years.

We spotted this baby elephant on a game drive and asked our driver if it was unusual to see a baby this small with no adult elephants around. He said that the baby was likely an orphan. We informed the park rangers upon leaving the park and, hopefully, they took care of the baby.

Even with all the death that seemed to be in this park, we also saw quite a bit of new life and families surviving.

We also saw many animals feeding and hanging out in the water around the park.

We saw some of the usual spotted animals......

and some of the not-so-usual spotted animals.

Our driver had to help this driver to get unstuck. We were glad it wasn't us needing help and that our vehicle was a little more off-road appropriate.

--Sarah--