The WILD LIFE!

I don't even know where to begin with all the animal viewing we've had over the past week! WOW! We did three major game drives: Lake Manyara, the Serengeti, and Ngorongoro Crater. All were absolutely amazing, and we were closer to wild game than we ever thought possible!

In Lake Manyara, the stand out were the elephants. It was a somewhat rainy day, and a herd of elephants had just enjoyed sloppy mud baths when our truck found them. They proceeded to surround our vehicle, and we had huge, muddy beasts on all sides, close enough to touch! It was incredible! We sat there with the engine off for quite a while. There were younger ones playing around and butting into each other, and older ones slurping up puddle water in their trunks to take a drink. All of them watching us, as we watched them. Amazing!

In the Serengeti, the hightlights would have to be the lions and the Wildabeast migration. We saw several prides/groups of lion throughout the day, and some extremely close! My favoriate would have to be a couple (one male, one female), who were lying right in the road. The male sat up and took in our scent, which allowed for great shots of his long teeth (lions smell through their mouth). It was fantastic! Another highlight is the female we saw up in a tree. She had her hind legs strattling the large branch she was on...her legs were just hanging in the breeze on either side of it -- it was so funny looking! Anyway, lots of great shots, and I can't believe we were so close to lion. The wildabeast migration was also something quite amazing! Wildabeast in the Serengeti make an annual trek between Tanazania & Kenya. Right now, they're returning to the Serengeti, and we saw literally thousands of the animals at a time with every glance in their direction. Once, their path even overtook our road, so we were part of the migration -- amazing! The zebra also join them on the trip, so we saw plenty of zebra mixing with the herds.

In Ngorongoro crater, the highlight is probably a toss up between the black rhino we saw (they didn't do anything but eat grass, but they're very rare, so it was a treat!), the cheetah (there were two at a distance, but even at a distance, they look so regal and sheek -- just beautiful), and then, the hippo (simply because we saw some of them get out of the water and move around -- every other hippo we'd only seen from the eyeballs up as they soaked the rest of their bodies under water).

Anyway, the game drives were an unbelievable success, and we also saw tons of giraffe, warthogs, gazelles, impala, topi, beautiful birds, and so much else! Can't wait to be able to upload photos!

Mere & Julie