This morning we got a lie in compared to yesterday, today was to be a last game drive as we head out of the Serengeti and into the Ngorongoro Crater. Once we were back into the Safari vehicles Haron asked what we still wanted to see, Joanna said real lions aka Adult males with a 'proper mane'.
We opened the roof and set off, this did lead our guide Haron to complain that it was too cold (in fairness it is the Tanzanian winter).
Our first spot on the way out of the park was a 'real' male lion
Or if you look closely 3 fully grown male lions, these are likely brothers that now hunt as a pack.
Look at those muscles
One of the lions decided it was time to sit down
And now it decided to try out shampoo modeling
We continued on out of the Serengeti and found some more cheetahs
We spent a while watching the cheaters stalking some gazelle but needed to continue out of the park before we could see a kill. On the way through the park we found a lion having ostrich for breakfast (There were a lot of feathers)
Once we left the park we found a couple of giraffes
We also came across this monument to some ancient remains that have been discovered in the area.
We arrived at the Ngorongoro Crater and started our descent into the world's largest inactive, intact and unfilled volcanic caldera.
Once in the crater it did not disappoint, firstly with .. gazzels
A lion
Loads of Wildebeest and Zebras
This bird
This bird is known as the secretary bird, it's a bird of prey that mostly hunts on the ground
Now for another bird of prey, this a black kite, similar to the red kites found in Oxfordshire
We then stopped for lunch at a pool with lots of hippos (and loads of land cruisers)
123 how many Land Cruisers can you see?
Hippo's
Warthog
Wildebeest
Grants gazelle
Wildebeest
Buffalo
An elephant skull - when an elephant dies in the park the rangers cut the tusks off make make the park unattractive to poachers
We then headed out of the crater and spotted a couple Buffalo
The zebra were having a post lunch snooze
A Thompson gazelle
The view back down into the crater
Our last elephant (much to Joanna's disappointment) look at those tusks
I need a new sticker for the Land Rover
Once out of the crater there was a viewing platform, someone pointed out a couple of rhino, with 30x zoom (~720mm) we could just about see them possibly even three. play the game of spot the rhino:
Here's some help
On the way out of the park we found some baboons playing around the vehicles.
The true winner of our safari was the Coca-Cola company who produce the Kilimanjaro branded bottled water that was served everywhere we went.
That night we stayed at Eileen's Trees Inn, this was different to the other lodges and camps but had a wonderful setting and vegetable gardens
We headed to bed later than usual. We spent the evening chatting with the fellow members of the tour as it was to be our last night all together.
Till our last post tomorrow
David & Joanna
