Serengeti Safari

Awakening in Arusha's morning mist, we were taken to the office of the safari company we had hired, Basecamp Tanzania, and it's gregarious leader, Achmed. Achmed is a Briton of German heritage who is has been married to a Tanzanian woman for many years. He sports a Kaiser's moustache, complete with twisted ends that curl into circles on each end. This morning, one of the ends was limping slightly. Liz and I were also limping, as we entered the office and penetrated the cloud of cigarette smoke between us and Achmed. "Generator day!" He shouted above the lawn-mower-like roar outside. "...Tuesdays and Thursdays...do you want to check your e-mail?"

While waiting for our jeep to be packed, we chatted with Achmed and learned some new details about our last adventure. In a Beatle-esque deadpan, he recounted: "Oldonyo Lengai: I had some clients on it when it erupted in June, ...I don't personally enjoy climbing mountains."

So, it turns out that our lunch spot at the top was lava flow from less than two months ago. Funny that no one mentioned that to us yesterday. Achmed showed us a video clip taken by his clients of lava flowing out of the volcano and encouraged us to read more

We were introduced to our companions for the next four days, Christian (driver & guide) and Wilfred (cook). Liz and I struggled with the concept of having two people working for us - a strange complement to what I see as an odd activity: driving around looking for animals. The agenda, we were reminded, includes 2 1/2 days at Serengeti National Park, followed by one day in the Ngorogoro Crater. Off we went.

On our way to the Serengeti, we stopped at Olduvai Gorge, the area where Homo Erectus was known to walk the land. In the car, we started to feel that we were in the wilderness, Christian would direct us to elephants on the horizon and even to giraffes munching on trees right near our car. When we stopped to observe a lioness nursing her cubs, it was clear that we were in Serengeti. "You are very lucky," Christian assured us after seeing the baby lions, introducing us to the aim of his position: to make sure that the clients are lucky.

After a long drive, we arrived at the campsite and Wilfred burst into action. In a kitchen bustling with chefs, he established himself in a corner and got to work. The rest of us grabbed our tents and looked for a campsite. Liz, noting the wire over the dining area and the kitchen asked, "Christian, what is the wire for?" "To keep out the baboons," he answered rather unconvincingly. "And..." Liz prodded. After a long pause, Christian admitted, "Lions. They come here in the night to drink water. Be careful if you get up to pee in the middle of the night."

The Safari was a lot of fun. We rode comfortably in the jeep, enjoyed the scenery during the long silences and admired the animals when we could find them. We saw "everything" as they say, though we were eluded by the Rhinos. We saw Lions, Hippos, Giraffes, Elephants, Buffaloes, Cheetahs, Leopards, Zebras & more. The baby lions were Liz's favorite. Cute! I liked the Giraffes the most. Impressive.

The lions at Ngorogoro Crater are known to enjoy the shade of the jeeps. We had heard that they come so close, you could reach out and touch them. It's true, we were visited by a relaxed pack of lions and enjoyed seeing them up close. It was, however the most zoo-like part of the tour. It was much more interesting when we saw some focused lionesses marching down the road slowly toward a pack of warthogs. They stalked their prey quietly, approaching stealthily through the tall grass. We held our breaths in anticipation and then suddenly, Pounce! A lioness grabbed a warthog in her teeth and another chased the pack, losing steam before catching another through the frantic squealing. The lion (king) promptly grabbed the caught warthog and started to eat. That's how it works apparently, only the women hunt and the men eat first.

After four days, we felt very satisfied with our wildlife viewing and were ready for a slower pace. We went to the western slope of Mt. Kilimanjaro and relaxed there for a few days. After that, we made our way to Nairobi, via Moshi. In Nairobi, we started to ease ourselves back into the developed world, enjoying organic food and movies. After that, it was time for the three-day journey home, reflecting on a spectacular six weeks in Tanzania.

The full slideshows from our trip are here:
Zanzibar
(mainland) Tanzania

Oldonyo Lengai

After staying put in Zanzibar for a month, we made our way to the mainland of Tanzania. Our first stop was Moshi where we met up with our Tanzanian friend, Simon and his American fiancee, Tara. Together, we were planning to climb a volcano called Oldonyo Lengai. The volcano is revered by the Maasai people as "Mountain of the Gods." It's revered by tourists as a great place to watch the sunrise. The plan was to start at 1 am, in order to get to the top by 6:00 am. We were told that it's safe now to climb it, though it is sometimes active.


The drive to Oldonyo Lengai put our 4x4 to the test. The road was incredibly bumpy and laden with levels of dust that I had never seen before. The mid-day heat made us want the windows open, but we would rush to shut them again as vehicles passed us, kicking piles of dust into our jeep. We stopped for lunch near the volcano and from out of nowhere, were met by a trio of massai boys, clearly as intrigued by us as we were by the golf-ball sized sticks in their ears.

Arriving at our campground parched and caked with dust, we were stunned see a rushing river. We went on a hike upriver to a gorgeous waterfall where we rinsed and refreshed ourselves. Back at the campground, we ate and wound down quickly, in order to catch some Z's before waking up at midnight for the climb.

When we awoke under the moon, other campers were awake from the night before. We ate a midnight "breakfast" and embarked for another bumpy, dusty drive, this time in the dark. A close call on a steep section of road tested my alertness. We nearly tipped over, trying to scale a deeply washed out hill, but it was "hakuna matata" [no problem].

Headlamps lighting the way, we started our ascent up the steep slopes of Oldonyo Lengai. My mind focused on thoughts of home, pondering various expectations for my return to the life in North America. This served as a practical distraction from the moonlit mountaintop above. Unused to exerting itself at this hour, my body protested and I found myself trying to catch up with the others between rest breaks.

The hours went by and we made steady progress. The slope got steeper and I gained in alertness along with it. Simon, Tara and Liz were doing great. We would make it to the top for sunrise, our guide assured us.

5 hours later, we reached the surface of the moon - or at least that's what it looked like to me. Building-sized cones matched by equally imposing caverns leading to "the center of the earth" as Lizzie said. We walked to the sunrise side, passing vents of steam and climbing over crumbly white chunks of ash. It was like being at one of those national parks where there is volcanic activity (Yellowstone, Lassen) and walking in all of the places where you're not supposed to.

We watched the sunrise from a glacier-esque patch of hard grey lava. We ate our "lunch" and turned to descend.

Getting down was easier than climbing as my hiking shoes gripped the steep slope. Liz's running shoes were less cooperative, so as I had needed extra time on the way up, she needed it for getting down. We took our time, sipping our water and enjoying the spectacular morning view. It took us almost as long to get down as it did to get up, but at the bottom, Simon was waiting for us with some freshly cooked sweet potato. He was characteristically teasing the Maasai boys nearby that he wanted to buy one of their sheep, because he was hungry. "I need to ask my Dad..." was their reply "...he counts them."

Savoring food and wobbly walking, we looked up at where we'd been and agreed that we didn't know quite what we were getting into.

We had an eventful return trip with some jeep trouble, and a subsequent successful highway tow to a gas station. We were eventually deposited in Arusha, said goodbye and limped into the shower before going to sleep before our wildlife safari, due to start the next day.

Oldonyo Lengai