The Fabled Serengeti

It's been almost a week since we've come across an internet connection, so there's quite a lot to report.

I think we left off at Arusha, Tanzania, which is where most Serengeti safaris depart from. Our first night in Arusha was spent at a campsite in Maasai country. The Maasai are local natives who you see everywhere tending their cattle in distinct red robes and ornate jewelry. Really, we expected our interaction with them to consist only of watching them curiously from within our 4X4 as we drove past them, but that did not end up being the case.

As we enjoyed a Kilimanjaro lager at the campsite bar, three of these tribesmen walked in (many of them guard the perimeter of the campsite) and promptly began playing darts. We watched curiously for a few minutes until Mary simply could not resist going over and joining the fun. It was only a matter of minutes before we were high fiving, dancing, trash talking, the whole nine yards. When one of them would miss the bullseye Mary would even say "warrior? really? I don't think so" - which really heated up the competition. Mind you these guys are adept at thrown spears and shooting bow and arrows - it really wasn't much of a competition. Anyway, it turns out that these three Maasai were not guarding the site, but were guests there while they trained for the London marathon on April 15 as a way to raise funds for water for their village (insanely, they are running the entire race WITHOUT water as a way to call attention to their cause). They were at the campsite with a British filmmaker who was filming a documentary about their journey to the UK, which would be the first time they'd traveled anywhere outside their area. So we chatted with them about their trip between high fives, and one of them had a total crush on Mary. Whenever he would hit a bullseye (which was frequently, as these guys are accustomed to handling spears and arrows), he wouldn't pull it off the board until Mary had seen it and approved in the form of a high five and a "Woohoo!" Hilarious! We have pictures, and hopefully we can get them up on the blog sometime soon. If you have access to the London marathon on tv you should try and catch them in action. We dubbed them the Maasai Six and I promise it's worth the watch.

After this very unexpected encounter, the next day we headed out for the Serengeti... definitely one of the things we were most looking forward to on our Africa trip. The first thing we came across were the fabled Serengeti plains. Really, without seeing any wildlife at all, they would have been impressive on their own. Flat golden plains as far as the eye could see, it was quite a sight. Note to all fans of the song "Africa" by Toto: Kilimanjaro does not, as they claim, "rise like a leopardess above the Serengeti" - disappointing. It's actually several miles from the Serengeti. Come on, Toto, get it together.

It wasn't long into our plains drive that we starting seeing the wildlife: the first thing we saw was a hyena chowing on a bloody carcass of some poor animal. It wasn't clear what it was or how the hyena got it, but it was pretty gruesome. And there were five or six vultures just hanging around for the leftovers of the leftovers. Nasty creatures.

Then we saw gazelles and zebras by the hundreds. They were seriously EVERYWHERE. With this much prey around, we had high hopes of seeing a lion, leopard or cheetah. But before seeing any of those, we drove right by a herd of about a dozen elephants, which were all walking across the plains while protecting a tiny little baby that couldn't have been more than a few weeks old according to our guide. Very cool. Further on into the park we caught sight of our first lions, a pair of them sleeping underneath a tree. As we slept at our campsite that night (completely out in the open), we could hear the roar of the lions closeby. The next morning we learned that the roars were from a group of seven of them who were in the midst of taking down a water buffalo about a quarter mile away! Wow.

On our way out of Serengeti NP that next morning, we had a lucky break. Our car broke down, which our driver fixed in about 15 minutes. But as were waiting, we saw a crowd of vehicles gather across the way. Once the car was fixed, we drove over to find five lionesses hanging out by the side of the road with a baby cub amonst them! We were able to pull around and watch them from a distance of about fifteen feet for a good twenty minutes or so. Amazing. Again, we hope to get pics up at some point.

We then drove on to the Ngorngoro Crater nearby, which has the highest concentration of wildlife around. Here we saw MORE lions, this time on the hunt! They actually crossed right in front of us (about five lionesses with two cubs) on their way to stalking a group of wildebeests and zebra! Talk about intense... the zebras were all standing in a line, huffing and puffing... a sentinel wildebeest was running around in front of the lions trying to scare them off... and the lions just kept strolling forward slowly, heads held low, eyes ahead. Unfortunately they didn't strike, as a truck with a Canadian film crew annoyingly kept getting sidling right up next to them, clearly foiling their hunting strategy, but it was still very cool to see. Darn you Canadian film crew! (No offense to our Canadian friends Wendy and Tammy). Definitely something we'll never forget.

And on our way out of the crater, we had another amazingly close encounter: this time with an elephant. We drove by a couple of them nibbling on trees about 20-30 feet from the road, which was great. But then an enormous one emerged out of the bush and proceeded to start munching on an acacia tree about a foot from our truck! Literally, Mary could have stuck her hand out the window and grabbed the tusk. It was unreal. And he probably stayed there for a good five or ten minutes, so we got a great look at him... almost TOO good.

Our friends Mike and Jill Buhrfiend had prepared us well for this leg when they shared their Serengeti video but nothing can truly prepare you for the reality of the experience. We did do a tribute to their trip, however, when we realized that packed lunches can be quite dodgey and resorted to a strict Pringles and Coke Light lunch diet. Mike, you were definitly with us in spirit!

On to Zanzibar for some serious beach time!