Optional tour time and I decided that I could not miss the Serengeti, despite it being the most expensive optional tour of our whole time on the trip. A group of 13 of us set off for a 2 night, 3 day game drive which as it worked out, will be something I will remember for the rest of my life.

We had 2 safari Toyota Land cruisers. The locals buy Toyota utilities and then have them modified for safaris. The cars can comfortably seat 9 people. 2 in the front and 7 in the back, single seats down the side of the car and then 3 seats across the back. The roof of the car lifts up about 60cm so that you can also easily stand beside or in front or on your seat and look out onto the game and scenery. If you have people in the front there is also a hatch above the driver's section that you can pop open and stand straight up to look out. Everyone also has a window next to their seat that they can open. Basically you can get a photo/view without glass obstructing your view at any time from your seat or standing. Our drivers/guides were Livingston and Simba (which we found rather amusing). They had the funniest giggles which were infectious and made you giggle with them. Usually when we made a request like 'Livingston, could we please see a kill today?' he would giggle and then say, 'no promises, but we will see'. We now know that he was comfortable in the knowledge that you could basically see everything and more in the Serengeti and when you put that together with Ngorongoro Crater you are basically guaranteed a smorgasboard of sights that take some believing and will not be forgotten quickly.

We started at Lake Monyaro were we saw lots of baboons, some elephants, giraffes, flamingos, hippos in the distance and birds. We were a little dis-heartened as we had to drive a long way seeing nothing but foliage before we got to see things. We were praying that our three days would not be like this.

Day two and we rose at 5am so that we could be on the road at 6am to catch the animals at their most active - the morning. We headed to Ngorongoro Conservation Park where we were focusing on the crater area. This crater occurred 2.5 million years ago when a volcano collapsed -or something like that… We could see the crater as we came in from above and it had a massive lake and lots of grasslands. Again worry set in as I could not see any animals or trees for them to live in and around and so thought that perhaps there were not many to be seen. How wrong I was! As we drove down into the crater the animals started appearing and what a show I was in for. The animals all live in the crater in view of each other, in I guess somewhat harmony. We saw:

· Elephant**

· Black Rhino

· Giselle

· Impala**

· Bustard*

· Hyena*

· Lions (54 in total. We are Lion magnets!!)**

· Ostrich**

· Zebra**

· Jackal*

· Giraffe (not in the Crater itself)

· Lesser and Greater Flamingo's

· Heartebeast

· Wildebeest**

· Grey Crowned Crane

· Hippo's**

· Dikdik

· Warthog**

· Cape Buffalo**

* = our first sighting in Africa

** = also seen in the Serengeti

Other animals besides those above seen in the Serengeti include:

· Leopard

· Vultures

· Crocodiles

· Hyrax

· Cheetahs

I was also blessed to see some of the Wildebeest migration. Little did I know that Zebra and Impala also migrate with the Wildebeest. We went up to a look out point and in one direction all I could see were black spots that were the Wildebeest. Our guide informed us that we were in fact not seeing the height of the migration and that at some points in the year you could not see the ground for animals. I was overawed by the sight in front of me and can't even imagine seeing it at it's height - maybe one day I will get to return at that time and see the migration in full glory.

Lady luck was also smiling on us in terms of the big cats we had the pleasure of viewing. On our first day we got a glimpse of a Leopard, but to be honest, you had to squint whilst looking through the binoculars or take a photo and zoom in digitally to see some spots and it was hard to determine exactly which part of the leopard you were actually looking at. Luckily day 2 was more fruitful and we got a glimpse of 2 Leopard cubs with their mother - I say glimpse as once again it was zooming in on the camera to try to determine if it was a face or butt you were actually looking at, but our patience was rewarded when we revisited the tree from the night before and a Leopard was still there. We thought we were doing ok when our first photos showed us a leopard reclining on a branch but again a lot of squinting and camera digital zooming. We were about to drive off happy to have glimpsed a leopard when all our Christmas presents arrived at once and the Leopard decided to change trees!! He/she first stood, we gasped; then moved about, we twitched with glee; and then, it jumped down the trunk, we gasped with pure delight! Of course it jumped into grass so there was a tense 10 minutes of 'where did it go? Do you see it? How fast can they run?'. Livingston decided it was time to change spots and look in another tree. A quick drive and we were rewarded with our leopard again now in a tree with it's kill of a dead Impala, obviously one he prepared earlier. Leopards drag whole animals up trees so that they can eat them in relative peace and quiet. Again it was a bit of photo taking and zooming, but all in all it was the perfect Christmas present to see such an elusive cat.

Some crazy driving later and we were stunned to find ourselves across from 2 cheetahs. We were slightly in shock at having seen Lions, Leopards and Cheetahs all in the same day and also within a few hours of each other. The Cheetahs were clearly hungry so we got some good shots of them stalking along. It was just a shame that there was no food about for them to get really serious about. As we were driving out of the park on our 6 hour journey back to our truck we were given our final surprise of a male lion sunning himself by the side of the road. We had until this point seen a couple of male lions today but none that close and usually looking in the opposite direction or laying on their backs sunning themselves which makes for one funny photo but a rather boring album of photos.