Serengeti plains – Let Me Clareify

The Serengeti is one of, if not the most beautiful landscape I have ever seen. Most of the things people associate with the Serengeti are animal related, like the big cats or the great migration (both of which were incredible). Maybe it’s because I’m not crazy about big cats or really obsessed with any of the animals as some of the future wildlife managers on this trip are, but I’ve found myself being more conscious of the types of vegetation, the soils, the rock formations, the cloud shapes and the landscapes than I ever was back at home. As far as these normal expectations for Serengeti go, we had two perfect days there. These two days involved sightings of lions, cheetah and leopard, as well as a viewing of the magnitude of great migration. For the migration, it looked as though Pixar had set up a green screen and pressed the multiply button to create the effect of hundreds of thousands of wildebeest and zebras filling the plains as far as the eye can see. The farthest visible were just dots on the horizon.

Before I get too far ahead of myself, let me tell you a little about life in the Serengeti for the week. The drive from Rhotia (where our home is while in Tanzania) to Serengeti took about 4 hours, with a few stops and some car troubles. We stopped at one spot on the way called Oldupai Gorge, which was just before the beginning of the Serengeti plains. Oldupai (usually found written as Oduvai but was translated incorrectly) is known as the cradle of mankind and an extremely important ecological site. It was a pretty amazing place. We had a woman who works there talk to us about all the archaeological findings in the gorge including a remain from every chain of human evolution. We had a campsite for all 30 of us plus about 15 staff members. Our tents were big army size ones with four of us to one tent. There was a big room used for cooking and eating with ledges to sit on. The bathrooms were pretty nice; we had running water, two normal toilets and two porcelain holes. I’m actually starting to prefer the holes; my aim is getting pretty impressive ☺. We had two askaris travel with us like our last expedition but since this campsite wasn’t fenced, we had to be walked by an asakri anywhere on the site after dark. There were hyenas behind my tent every night, probably no more than 15 meters, and a few people saw them on their late night walks to the bathroom. I was lucky enough to only hear them, but even that was a little startling. Their whooping and laughing was not a comforting noise.
Back to the park itself though, we were able to get out and game drive everyday for almost the entire day, other than a short talk from the warden in the afternoon on Wednesday, we were in the land cruisers and on the move. Wednesday and Thursday were easily two of the best days of my life. Sounds crazy but there was barely a moment where I wasn’t in awe whether it be the clouds or the lighting or the lion two feet away from me, I was in a constant state of wonder. My favorite sighting from the trip occurred on Wednesday’s afternoon game drive. There are these groups of rock formations in a certain part of the park called kopjes, and they happen to be nestled on the top of the gradient incline above where much of the migration was occurring. It was the epitome of pride rock and just as we drove up to it, a male lion rolled to his side and sauntered to the tip of the highest rock. He stopped and just gazed off into the plains in front of him with his mane blowing in the wind. Surrounding him on various rocks were at least 6 females, 2 other males and two juveniles. After the male presented himself to us, one of the young hopped up on a dead tree behind the male and lounged like samba would on the outstretched branch. The lion king references were unavoidable. I felt pretty complete after that lion siting but we had still yet to see a cheetah. On Thursday we ended up seeing a total of 3 cheetahs, 6 lion prides and 3 leopards. Without spoiling too much for the two lucky people who I get to return to the Serengeti with (rowan and mom *cough cough*), I’d say that’s my trip in a nutshell. I can’t wait to go back!!!

Leopard in the grass

Mama lion who was perched on a rock alone

The sunset after Wednesday’s game drive

Some really awesome cloud that formed wile the double rainbow was across the sky

The bottom of the double rainbow on Wednesday with some tembo (elephants) as the pot of gold!

The Great Migration

WIldebeest and Zebra all bunched up

A munching giraffe

We had a celebration at the lodge on Thursday for the completion of my rabies vaccines. My friends made me a rabies free crown and bought me a mimosa 🙂