Serengeti

Jamie had made this video on Sunday, but I neglected to post it until now.  I was thinking I'd hold off and post it at the end, but I realize now that it's better now then later!  (For a better quality video click here).

After our venture into Lake Manyara National Park, we began the journey to the Serengeti.  In the end, it was long one extended game drive.  We spotted giraffes and elephants everywhere as we passed over the caldera -- we would later return and enter Ngorogoro Park -- but for this day we were just passing through.  

The Maasai have a good eye for real estate.

Once we entered into the Serengeti the landscape became drier and we started seeing more gazelles, warthogs, and LIONS.  These were the first lions we spotted on our trip.

But shortly after spotting them, we saw the ultimate: Mufasa on Pride Rock.

Yes, I'm aware this is Simba.

Close enough, anyway.  I was happy.  The last thing we spotted before we got to the lodge was a leopard.  Actually three leopards (including two cubs).  Apparently this is something of a rarity -- leopards are extremely secretive and especially hard to spot -- so we figured we had used up all of our safari karma on the first day.

We finally got to our next lodge at sundown and appreciated the view from our room (again).  The lodge was very nice -- Jamie and I were given the honeymoon hut (which I think was the same as all of the others but just more central) so we decided not to break it to them that we have been married for almost 4 years.  We were warned against walking on the grounds after nightfall without a gun-wielding guard.  Lions and elephants supposedly ran rampant at night.  I think they were just trying to build up the novelty of the lodge...Jamie and I just walked a little faster from place to place after sunset.  Just in case.

The view from our bed.

The view from the balcony.

The next two days we got to traverse the Serengeti.  So many pictures.

One of the highlights was when we found a tree with EIGHT lion cubs lounging in it.  EIGHT.  (Unfortunately, the pictures of the cub tree didn't come out too well -- there were camouflaged after all.

Can you spot them all?

All in all, a pretty memorable trip through the Serengeti.

Tanzania Recap: Arusha --> Lake Manyara

First day back at work today.  While it was a nice day (i.e. kids were great, it was nice to see friends again), I still am missing our time in Tanzania.  Oh well...I get to recap!

In Arusha after our first night of aimless wandering, we were able to check out the Cultural Center and a great little store called Shanga, which was located on a coffee plantation.  There, they took empty wine bottles and recycled them to create glass beads for jewelry.  All of the glass workers and weavers were deaf and/or mute in an effort to provide them with more opportunities to earn money.  

Our first stop after leaving Arusha was Lake Manyara.  We checked into our lodge and immediately began appreciating the view from our little hut.

But the real fun began the next morning when we took our Land Cruiser into the park.  Immediately upon leaving the lodge we bumped into a small herd of elephants munching on foliage right alongside our truck.

It was a pretty great start to our safari.  Lake Manyara was a truly beautiful park.  It was a paradise for monkeys -- we saw a ridiculous number of baboons and vervet monkeys there.  The vervet monkeys are identifiable by their bright blue and red, um, "male parts". 

We saw plenty of other types of wildlife at Lake Manyara as well -- hippos, giraffes, wildebeest, warthogs, so many different types of birds.  While I'm not going to upload all those pictures here...you can get the idea.

A hippo print in the mud.

And, of course, the landscape was just breathtaking.

That same day, we started our trip to the Serengeti.  I'll that for the next post, though.  Time to turn in...