The Serengeti's Big 5

2011 has been a great year for travel. Indu and I started the year in China and ended it in Mexico. In between it was NY, Niagara, SFO and Grand Canyon in the US and the one big trip to Africa. Given I am getting older and its been 2 months since we did the Africa trip, its time to write it down before I forget.

Since Mr.M told about his Kenya trip a few years back, doing the wildlife safari in Africa's Serengetti has been stuck in the back of my mind. As life would have it, there have been so many other distractions... ohh say, like getting married... and other trips to other places, and the Africa trip was still in the back burner. With Indu (by now the connection should be clear... Indu is my - air quoted - better half! :p ) also very excited about travel and with M&A and others also getting excited about Africa and the stars aligning the right way, it was time for Africa. And what a trip it was. One of the best trips ever.

Before getting into the awesome details of this awesome trip (I need to use an abbrv for the word 'awesome' since its going to pop a zillion times in this post, but I promise to control myself!), I first need to get the rant out of the way. The travel from the US to Tanzania was a looooooong one. Let me repeat that to justify my rant. It was loooooooooooong. On the way in, the flight time was 22 hours, on the way back it was even worse... 30 hours and one stretch was 17 hours - Adis Ababa to Washington, DC. Actually we started from Zanzibar on our way back and the route was Zanzibar to Dar-es-salam to Arusha to Mombasa to Adis Ababa to Rome to Washington, DC to Seattle! Thats 6 stops touching 5 countries! Now having ranted about the flights, it was still definitely worth the trip and we will happily repeat it if we get a chance!

Here is the picture story... lets start with our favorite Simba from Lion King... but this time for real in its real habitat and not some animation!

Lion pride

We were 6 of us (Mrs.A, Mr.M, Mr.A, Mr.N, Indu and I) and left Seattle at different times promising to converge in Arusha, Tanzania. All of us landed at the Kilimanjaro International Airport at different times. This airport is right at the base of Kilimanjaro and believe me, none of us saw the actual mountain since it was covered with low hanging clouds all the time - even on our way out a week later... that was a bummer.

After a night in Arusha at Kibo Palace and some shopping nearby... ofcourse, the first thing we do after landing in Tanzania... yes, we went shopping!:) We were pretty surprised to hear the live music / DJ playing some Indian songs, later we would learn that there is a substantial Indian settlement in Tanzania.

and here we go with a Pumbaa...

Wild Hog

The next day morning was the start of our Safari... we went with Naipenda Safaris. I need to mention Indu's amazing research talent here. She researched for our trip for a month and we ended up with Naipenda and what a choice it was. The safari and our guide Chris were truly brilliant. Chris had eagle eyes in spotting animals and was very knowledgable. He had worked with NatGeo photographers and hence knew and adviced on photo angles when we were near the animals. Also the accomodations during the safari were first class - remember these are in the middle of nowhere.

The first day was at Tarangire and what an entry it was. As soon as we entered the gates of Tarangire, we were treated with a small migrating herd of wildebeest. We couldnt believe our very first sight inside the park was one that compared to the NatGeo shots of migrations. That day we went on to see elephants, lions, giraffes, zebras, gazelles. By the way, I should note the Big 5 animals before I forget: Lion, Elephant, Rhino, Buffallo, Leopard. The very first day we managed to see two of the five. And then we promptly got lost on our way to the camp and spent an extra 30 minutes doing real off-roading to find our camp. And what a place Lake Burunji tented camp was.

Zebras in Tarangire

Each room was actually a tent suspended from a thatched wooden structure! And they warn you not to wander outside alone. They gave us a whistle to use if we wanted help! So imagine this, we are in the middle of wildlife inside a cloth tent with no electricity after midnight and they give us a whistle to blow if there is an emergency! So yes, the experience is definitely worth it. We even saw gazelles grazing right outside our tents!

The next day we left for Lake Manyara. We were travelling on this highway for 70 or so miles and right next to the highway we see giraffes! You need to be there to understand how unbelievably great the sight was. A highway stretching straight for miles. The land is mostly flat on either side and behind you. You see the Great Rift Valley and its imposing cliff wall many miles ahead of you. And then you see this giraffe right next to the road - just a few feet away from you! Right now, as I write this, I want to go back for another visit! :) And I am sure the other 5 in our group would definitely feel the same way, especially Mrs.A who had a crush on giraffes!

Giraffe next to the highway!

That night we stayed at Bougainvilla lodge. The lodge was great, the swimming pool was great but.... we dont know why... they ran out of food for us during dinner. And their serving style was... lets say different. The server would come with the dish and stand next to you and you are supposed to serve yourself while he holds the dish. Anyway, the stay was good. We strolled out and the group randomly bought sugarcane from a local family though they couldnt bite it. Effects of our urban lifestyle I suppose.

In Manyara we did see Flamingoes though we were quite far which was a bummer. We did annoy a family of elephants since we had to drive through them to cross to the other side. Chris showed us first hand what elephants do when they get annoyed - which in turn annoyed Indu! :)

Elephant family

The next day we entered the Ngorongoro crater. Started at the view point that overlooked the entire crater. That crater is huge! This is where we spotted the Rhino which apparently is hard to come by. Again thanks to Chris's eagle eyes and our powerful binoculars and some creative imagination, we did see the Rhino... I think. We also saw cheetahs and lions here. By the way, we were seeing a lot many other animals and a truck load of gazelles by this point that I am not even mentioning. This was the third day and we already felt that the trip was a huge success.

That night we stayed in Ndutu lodge and I think this was our best location accomodation wise. These were huts in the middle of nowhere. Just getting to it was awesome. We were at the edge of Serengeti by then. Serengeti means endless plains and we understood what that meant driving to the lodge. They do mean it when they say endless! There was nothing around us except for few mountain tops at the horizon. We were driving with no roads and our guide said we just follow the sun west and we will hit an oasis of trees where the camp was. It was exhilarating and scary at the same time!

Sunset in Serengeti

The next couple of days were in Serengeti. We drove and drove and drove the first day to get to Northern Serengeti. And we saw and saw and saw gazelles and zebras and wildebeest that day. By some point we were ready to give up on sighting gazelles but we still couldnt peel our eyes away from them.

Lioness and her cub near Ndutu, Serengeti

To provide some in-vehicle entertainment, we did have Mr. A. So, we would all be standing up in the vehicle peering through the lift up roof. We will all be spotting animals and calling out to others if we spotted something interesting. During one such occassion, one of us spotted a cheetah and Chris stopped so we could take pictures. So imagine this, we are 7 of us in the vehicle and all of us are trying to look at a cheetah that was a couple of hundred feet away among the grass. Out of the seven, 6 of us would be looking at the right direction and looking at the cheetah(or atleast trying to locate it approximately in the right place and direction). Except for our man, Mr.A, who would be searching for it in an entirely different direction. Not just off by a few degrees but by a full 180 degrees. He would even be calling out some features of the cheetah and taking pictures until ofcourse Indu chanced to turn around and notice him looking at the opposite direction.

Ofcourse that reminds me of our in-vehicle food supplier - specifically trail mix supplier. Mr.N had brought along a box of trail mix packets. You might think whats the big deal, everybody carries chocolate bars or trail mix packets. But no, we take it to the extreme, atleast Mr. N does. The reason that this is worth mentioning is he had brought along an entire box - an entire Costco sized box of trail mix! And he had sacrificed his extra couple of sets of change clothes to supply all of us with a weeks worth of trail mix! :)

Lion in Serengeti

Anyway Serengti was awesome. We saw some Masai tribes and their settlements along the way. Our guide stopped to chat with a couple of young Masai adults. They kept checking their reflection on the vehicle's rear view mirror. Chris later explained that Masai dont have mirrors or glass and apparently these are their only opportunities to check out their face and see how they look!

We stayed at some amazing locations the next two nights in Lobo and Serenora lodges. We saw tree climbing leapords - one climbing up the tree with its hunt! You have heard of Zebra Crossings, and I am sure this is a cliche for people who have been to wildlife safaris. But here is my turn with photos of Cheetah Crossing and Giraffe Crossing and I would not annoy you further with our entire "crossing" collection! Believe me, we have elephants, lions, gazelle, wildebeest and ofcourse zebra crossings! :)

Cheetah crossing

Giraffe crossing

We saw some NatGeo style wildebeest and buffallo migrations. With Chris explaining some of the wildebeest behaviors it was funny to watch. So there will be a huge herd of wildebeest grazing calmly. Suddenly one wildebeest will get randomly spooked and start sprinting. All the wildebeest will then blindly start a stampede behind the first one. The best part was what happens next. They would sprint for a couple of hundred feet and abruptly stop and start grazing again calmly as if nothing had happened. It was a funny sight to watch!

Wildebeest migration in Serengeti

We also stopped at a hippo pool for a close look at the pool with around 100 hippos lazily sunbathing. We saw firsthand how hyegenic hippos were. It was disgusting but exciting to watch!

Hippo in Serengeti

Overall, this is one of the best trips yet. Definitely worth the long flight. Definitely worth another or even multiple followup trips! We learnt a lot, we were amazed by the sights, we didnt want to leave the place! Definitely thanks to our guide, Chris and our tour operator, Naipenda Safaris. They made our trip truly memorable. Ok, if you are wondering, I am not trying to plug an ad for them here, but just writing this down so if we ever make another trip to Africa we wouldnt have to hunt around for their names! :)

Just for fun and posterity, let me try to remember the animals that we saw in those 6 days... Lion, Elephant, Rhino, Buffallo, Leopard, Cheetah, Hippo, Wildebeest, Zebra, Giraffe, Gazelle, Topi, Dick-Dick, Waterbuck, Crocodile, Monkey, Baboon, WildHog, Gene-something!, Hyrex.... I know I am missing a lot more and I am not even counting birds. I hope the rest 5 of my group will add to this list.

Anyway, to sum it up, Awesome times zillion! :)