Hello darkness my old friend
I woke up about 2 AM, I hear the pitter patter of little paws. Some smaller 4 footed pawed animals were scurrying about outside the tent. Soon came the hooves. Then the burgh hrr hrr noises of the lions roaring.
I tried to record some of the noises but the audio didn’t quite get the noises. I fell back asleep and woke up at 5 am got ready and shook my lantern to start the day. We took off from the camp around 6 with a boxed breakfast for later. Right before we took off I decided to take a peak at my cameras, oh I should have done some work on them before I went to bed. There is dust everywhere. So I took some time wiping down the screens, lenses, filters etc. Glad I remembered to check this before we took off and I didn’t notice all of the dust spots on the pictures later.
We had a magnificent sunrise, the sun is huge here. The colors of the sunrise was amazing and we found a spot to watch it come up over the acacia trees. All of the birds were chirping and the guineafowl were running about.
All of the cats!
Today was cat day, more specifically cheetah day. First thing we found was cheetah, or duma. 2 cheetah just hanging out watching the hot air balloons rise up with the breaking of the day. Pushing ahead we found the elusive leopard who was out of his tree but he was playing a game of hide and seek as here comes the hyena who is sniffing out what must be the leopards breakfast. We sat and watched this for a good amount of time and what seemed like the hyena was walking right over where the where the leopard was crouched down, wondering how doesn’t he see him and will there be a fight or a territory war.
Eventually the hyenas sauntered off and the leopard disappeared from our view so we continued on. Eric quickly stopped the vehicle and exclaimed look, look! A serval cat was quickly darting off, this is a smaller cat which is mostly nocturnal and very rarely seen. He was moving fast and being small and buff colored himself he blended in with his surroundings quite well so while I did grab a few shots of him they didn’t turn out that great.
We stopped for breakfast at a picnic area and got to survey the land. Soon a tour bus of sorts shows up, this is not the way to do safari. It is legit like a tourist bus, you wouldn’t be able to get up and move around, there was no way to open windows to see better outside let alone get good shots. I would have been so frustrated to travel all of the way, get to the Serengeti and not have the opportunity to really get to see and experience it.
Continuing on the day we saw the warthogs, crocodiles, and a pod of hippos who were out of the water just arguing away. I like hippos but man are they smell ee! Soon enough we were back to the cats and spotted what looked like 2 cheetah, which upon further inspection came out to be a family of 4 of them. A mom and her 3 almost adult cubs. Eric was saying she is a very good mother. Cheetah will have a few cubs but since she needs to leave them and bring food back for them the cubs are easy pickings for prey so usually by the time they get older she is left with 1 maybe 2 if she is lucky and here this one is with all 3. They were enjoying a nice meal and of course being children were a little more of sloppy eaters so their beautiful fur was a little, okay a lot, blood tinged. Soon enough the cats were onto bath time and helping each other get more presentable.
Driving away we were soon upon a male lion. These cats have no care in the world for the vehicles, its like okay whatever. This massive guy was just strolling down the road with two trucks following in his wake, he walked right up to us to the point my long lens was way too much to get a good shot of him, good thing I had the backup camera all set with the shorter range.
We took a time out at the Serengeti Welcome Center for lunch and I had fun with the birds that were flitting about and the hyrax. These little guys are actually the closest relative to the elephant. Its hard to imagine these small little fuzzy things are related to the biggest animals on the planet. There was one in particular who was really interested in me and decided to say hello and asked to share my lunch.
The zebra were on the move for the migration and a herd of them were walking almost single file (maybe at most 2 by 2) and were barking away and headbanging away. I guess this a part of their way to keep the communication going for the way to go.
Doh! So I promise I am really not an amateur with my camera, no professional but I do know what I am doing. The day’s excitement and moving from thing to thing I didn’t notice that throughout the course of the day even though I had checked my settings in the beginning of the day I didn’t see that sometimes as I was swapping between cameras I had been slowing down my shutter speed accidentally. With the light of the day the back of the screen looked okay with some shots but in further look at them you would see moments weren’t as sharp as they should have been if the shutter speed would have been set at where it should be. Grr.
Eric wanted us to push on to get to our next camp for the night which was further north in the Lobo area. This was selected as this area is a good spot for seeing the migration this time of year but in chatting with Eric the migration started earlier this season and they were much further north. The drive quickly took a turn in scenery from grassland to woodland, you could see lots of damage in the trees from the elephants as well as they like to head up to the hill in the evening and stay in the trees at night for protection. On our way to the camp we did find yet another group of Cheetah, a coalition, that were looking like they were gearing up for an active night.
Mbuzi Mawe
The camp I stayed at this evening was called Mbuzi Mawe Serena Camp, pronounced mm boozy ma way. Checking in, they gave you the courtesy hot towel to clean up with and a glass of mango juice and gave the general details for the camp. The main lodge has dinner open at 7 PM. Each tent has its own power and of course at night you need to be escorted to and from. There is a phone in each tent so you can call up when you would like to be escorted over.
Eric and I made plans to reconnect up around 7ish so that we can chat about the next days event. Being lead to my tent I see yet again I get tent #7, and it is the last tent in the line. The security guy laughed and says oh you have adventure tent. Oh my! I wonder what awaits me here. The tent seems quite luxurious, there are outside seating lounge areas and entering the tent you have 2 queen sized beds, the phone they mentioned, a desk area, and the back was a huge bathroom fully equipped with hot water, it felt like the best shower ever.
I took some time and did the dust removal efforts of the camera equipment and determine the setup I wanted for the next day. It’s happening! Had my Toto moment, had the Rains down in Africa! Queue the song please and rain while in a tent sounds amplified. It was time to meet up with Eric. So I darted up to the main tent and we sat and discussed the next day. I had a 4 AM start so they kept asking if I wanted a wake up call. No I am okay I have my phone, they looked at me quizzically really you don’t need a wake up call. Yes I am okay. Ha!
Dinner was good but I decided to keep it to an early night as 4 AM will come quickly. I did notice that back in my tent they placed a large flashlight/emergency whistle next to the bed, so I guess I have company. As I drifted off to sleep I could hear the lions roaring in the distance. Ah such a relaxing sound…