Stacey says:

Day 2 Wednesday 9th September 2009

Today we had our transfer by shuttle bus from Nairobi to Moshi to Tanzania, 9 hours!! was a rickety old bus on a rickety old road, there were a few locals on it, but we were at the back with a few Aussies and a nutty retired couple, Bill and Barbara from Kansas, good on them for taking the bus! but they helped the journey pass quickly. However the Aussie lady was telling us the last time she climbed a mountain she got to 5900m and got cerebral Edema, fluid on the brain, causing it to expand, and lost her memory for 2 months after! (yikes!) We arrived at the hotel, pretty much had dinner and went to bed for our early start.

So, Day 3 Thursday 10th September 2009, we met Oscar our driver/guide for the jeep safari for the next 4/5 days. We spent 4/5 hours driving to Lake Manyara National Park. It sure was a smoother journey on the road in the jeep! We stopped to have our packed lunch, then drove through the park for a few hours. I didn't expect to see soo many animals in this park. We saw baboons, zebra, wildebeest, monkeys, gazelles, giraffes and elephants. Here I had my first hole in the floor toilet experience, was not pleasant at all!! But the park was a good taster before going into the Serengeti. We arrived at the hotel for that evening, and had a Maasai welcome, they were singing and playing their drums, in their tribe clothes. We had passed a Maasai village on the way to the hotel, was a small area of land fenced off with sticks, with circular huts in the middle. To stop and visit the village however they wanted $25 dollars each person, because one of the guys had to learn English to explain to tourists about their way of life. It does become a little annoying when everyone wants paying to do anything. We stopped to take a photo of some scenery, these two little Maasai kids sprinted up the hill sooooooo fast to try and reach our car, they got to us out of breath, and just held their hands out for money! So we gave them sweets! The hotel we stayed in was very nice, really good food, usually soup, rice and stew, and fruit and cake for pudding.

Day 4 Friday 11th September 2009, we drove across Ngorogoro Park to reach the Serengeti National Park, we kept on asking our driver the previous day about our chances of spotting big cats, he said we need to be lucky. So we were a bit anxious about what we might see... on entering the park, driving along the road, there were two female lions trotting along together by the side of the road!! I was just totally taken back by it, didn't expect to see them so quickly and so close! we got snap happy with these two, but as the day went on we saw 2 prides of lions spaced out over 2 rocks, with lots of little cubs. The mum was chewing on an Impala, and the little cub was chewing on the leftover head, with the horns popping out of the carcass!! gross!!!! We got some great photos. We saw lots of the animals we saw in the Lake Manyara again also, in their herds and families, just lots more in the Serengeti. Was an absolutely fantastic day. We headed to our camp for about 6 o'clock, which was situated in the middle of the Serengeti! The camp was surprisingly really well set up, the tents were spacious, had lights, with portaloos and showers, with comfortable beds. Dinner was really good and healthy too! and there was a communal camp fire which everyone sat around and shared their stories of the day. I was a little freaked out going to sleep on the first night, was absolutely pitch black once the lights went out, and lots of strange animal noises throughout the night. But it was fine, no creepy crawlies at all in the tent either!!

Johno says:

Day 5 Saturday 12th September 2009

We woke up unzipped the tent only to find a Baboon resting up against the tent next door, admittedly I thought it was just a heap of grass but then Stace confirmed it was actually moving! Mr Dr Doolittle in me just wanted to go up to it and have a good stroke but thought better of it. The previous day had been so unbelievable I just couldn't wait to get rrright back out there again, today we were to spend a full day in the Serengeti in our Jeep with Oscar. The main aim for today was to tick off another of the big 5 in the form of a leopard, and that we did, there was a message over our radio from another jeep that there was a leopard spotted sitting in a tree, so after a few 3 point turns in the road we managed to get ourselves down to the leopard but because they are so shy didn't really managed a full glimpse, which made us a bit more determined to see another one! We drove on to find 4 lionesses that had just killed a zebra, and we could see a trail of zebra blood leading up to the tree in which they were storing the left over carcass for a later meal guarded by one of the lions as there were vulchers nearby whilst the other 3 lions were having a post meal snooze in a nearby shaded area. Absolutely amazing! THEN a scene unfolded as if it was out of a TV documentary whereby a cub had separated from the group running in a different direction, which was no big deal until we noticed a Cheetah watching the cub from under a tree nearby ready to pounce and kill the wondering cub! But luckily the mother stopped and listened to the cub cry, a cross between a lion roar and a squeak!! HAHA. the lion recovered the cub and the cheetah resting back down but still alert to the group of lions. Then we saw bath time for what seemed like never ending families of Elephants crossing the road to the lake, you think you have seen it the last then in the distance you see another family travelling with the adults at the back and front with baby Elephants of all sizes in the middle - great stuff. We then saw another female lion with a zebra but this proud lady had killed the zebra all by herself which was impressive, must have been the choice of meat for the day or something?! Again with the trail of blood indicating the path of the kill. Then exhausted, retired back to camp for another meal and a bottle of the finest Kilimanjaro lager by the bonfire - a must! During the night we listened to Hyenas laughing and Baboon's crying - I will let you do the math.

Day 6 Sunday 13th September 2009

After an eventful final sleep in the Serengeti Camp, we left after breakfast for the Ngogogoro crater, an area of 9x12 sq km. On the way we saw another two Cheetah's sunning themselves on the rocks chilling out and a much clearer view of a leopard in a tree which was a great spot. The crater allowed us to see all of what the Serengeti offers plus the final of the Big 5, and the most hunted, the Rhino. Also, there was flamingo, ostrich, hyenas, wildebeest. Two male lions were lazing under a tree with one that was rolled over showing his belly with the other sat beside him which i just know would've been well embarrassed about his mate's pose for the tourists.

We also saw some of the birds too - but really, who wants to hear about the birds??! Surely it is all about the dangerous animals!! HAHA.

In the evening we retired to our African pronounced 'IVY' Hotel (really High view Hotel) for some dinner which happened to be Impala meat that we had been spotting for the last few days!! Mmmmmm Impala, it was actually well nice and I didn't feel too bad as there were thousands out there!! You've got to try to local delicacy ... right?!

Day 7 - Monday 14th September 2009

This day was spent making our way back from the IVY, stopping off at some African shops and making our way back to the Springlands Hotel which is the base camp for all those taking on Mount Kilimanjaro. Jeeees, we are climbing it on Wednesday!! The rest of the afternoon was spent lazing pool side, what a contrast from a usual start of the week eh?!