19/03/15, Safari, Serengeti to Ngorongoro

We had a great night camping at the Serengeti. According to our driver there were many hyenas surrounding our camp. I didn’t hear or see them though, even though I went to the bathroom somewhere during the night 🙂 I’m glad I survived 😉

In the morning the day started off with a proper breakfast: toast, jams, ommelet, pancakes, sausages. And all made by our cook on a simple camp stove! Well done! After breakfast we set out for our game drive accross the Serengeti. Not long after leaving we could see a big herd of elephants at a distance. We stopped and watched for a while and at some point asked whether it was maybe possible to get any closer. According to the driver it unfortunately was not possible, but if we were lucky we could see some closer to the road later during the day. But hey! We saw elephants! On the Serengeti!

So we continued our ride and not even five minutes later we rode our car into the middle of a big herd of elephants, with various sizes of elephants grazing at either side of the road! And this was just spectacular! The driver claimed he had no idea they were there and that it was just luck. And we had them all to ourselves with no other vehicles anywhere near.

It was great to watch these big beasts with their long curved white tusks and flexible funtional trunks. They actually use the trunks to grasp grass from the ground and to put it in their mouths. And they do the same with water and thorny bushses. While the elephants were grazing, the herd slowly moved from left to right, meaning that there was a number of elephants that wanted to cross the road, right were our vehicle was standing. And so they did 🙂 In order to do so, one of the big ones intimidated us by spreading out his ears, shaking with his head and stamping with his feet, so that the others could safely cross. The big one always stayed between our car and the smaller onces. They really take care of each other!

Slowly the herd moved further and further away from the road. And at some point another vehicle pulled up and we decided to continue our way. It was nice, but now it was time to move on. We all felt so lucky and privileged!

Next stop was at a small river. On our way there we passed a number of trees full of baboons. And at the river we saw hippos, crocodiles and maribu storks. After that, the driver got word that a leopard had been spotted in a tree, so we went there to catch a glimps of it. It was hard to see but we definitely could see it, especially when it walked from one branch to another.

After the leopard we slowly made our way back to camp for lunch. We came across some more lions and saw many gazelles, wildebeest, zebras and other big mammals. After lunch it was time to make our way to the campsite on the rim of the Ngorongoro crater. On our way there we came accross the many migrating animals again. We are so lucky that we are on the Serengeti at the right moment so see the wildebeest, zebras, gazelles and many other species migrate north over the plains in search of fresh grass and fresh water. At the end of march most will have left the area that we came through today. Furthermore, most baby animals were born during february, so we saw many babies; wildebeest, zebra, gazelle and even baby lions!

We reached the crater rim around 5pm and made our way up while the sun was setting over the Serengeti. Another great day in this African adventure! Happy to be here, feeling very privileged…

Sunrise over our Serengetti camp