Over the next 5 days we were heading off to the 'Cream of Tanzania', the reason most people visit this Country; Mount Kilimanjaro, The Serengeti and the Ngorongoro Crater, all gems on the World's stage. Our first stop was at a Hotel at the foot of Mount Kilimanjaro, the Marangu Hotel. Because it is such a large feature it dominates everything around it and is seems that everything you see, do and touch is related to it somehow. Kilimanjaro Beer, Kilimanjaro Soap and Kilimanjaro Wetwipes to name a few. However because it is so big it also produces it's own weather systems that always involve some sort of cloud covering it, but not this day. We arrived to a beautiful view of the top of Kili with it's ever decreasing range of snow coverage (some say that the snow will be completely gone by 2018). Having said that, the top of Kili was still over 19km's away so it will always be a little blurry in the photo's. You really need to see it to appreciate the size. The next day we headed off to Arusha and the Meserani Snake Park which is where we abandon our Truck and jump into smaller Safari vechicles for the next 3 days. I remember the Snake Park from my last trip here in 1999 and not a lot has changed except that the snakes and crocodiles have gotten bigger, and that there were no chamelians anymore. The bar was the same, the owners the same, and the potency of the beer the same. But that is not what we were here for ...
The vechicle that picked us up were looking shmick; comfortable seats, water holders and pop up tops for uninterupted game viewing. Perfect so off we when. The first problem occured on the way there when our car decided to overheat. Our driver must have forgot to put coolant in because he just grabbed a bottle, went outside and filled up the radiator. So off we went again. The Ngorongoro Crater is one of those freaks of nature that sometimes occur. In it's previous life it was a volcano that would have rivalled Kilimanjaro in size but some millions of years ago, it collasped on itself and left a perfectly round caldera that measures 19km's in diameter and 600m deep. It has basically formed natures most perfect natural park. However we only stopped on the rim on the way through as today we were off to The Serengeti. Just like 'Nullabor' in the local Aboriginal language means 'endless plains', 'Serengeti' means the same in Swahili. This is someewhat true as when you are in certain places in does seem that you could look forever and not see anything, but only 10km's down the road you come across small rivers and trees and thousands and thousands of animals. By now our Safari vechicle and driver were working brilliantly (if not a little quick on these roads) but 2 other cars were having problems. The first was the gear box and the connections with the 4 wheels drive. All they did was dismantle the connection to the front wheels and it continued to work. The second was that the whole wheel fell off (at 100km's mind you). Once again, they just reattached the wheels (minus one bolt) and continued on. Besides these setbacks the trip into The Serengeti was a 100% success. We witnessed another Lion kill (once again missed the most important chapter, the actual kill), we encountered a Leopard in a tree that had dragged it's kill up there also and hung it from a branch for further meals, in the same photo you can see 6 different animals, we took the ultimate African sunset photo and the same sunrise photo, we had an Elephant breaking down trees right next to the camp site, we had Hyenas howling all night, we had a Cheetah an her 3 adorable cubs only 5m from the car and we had Lions staring down an Elephant. Where ever we drove that day we had something. At the end, and I don't want to brag, but we almost became sick of it all. We were very lucky.
But it didn't stop there as we now had the Ngorongoro Crater to see and hopefully a view Rhino's up close. The drive back to the Crater was uneventful except for the next broken down car and me yelling at them to get shit sorted. Anyhow we arrived back to Camp a little after sunset but with no new problems. The Crater game drive didn't live upto standards that the Serengeti set but never-the-less it was still great. We got to see our Rhino but he was a little agitated and didn't get to close. We even got to see more Lions !!!
It was a brilliant 3 days in the 'Cream of Tanzania'. I suppose the only thing to top it all off would be to climb Kilimanjaro but that will have to wait for another time, one where I'm a bit fitter :)