Lions, Tigers, and Bears?

Well I'm back in Tanzania, and my sister is finally here! It's really nice to see a familiar face from home, and it's great to be able to show her what I've been up to since January. Katie and I showed her around Dar and introduced her to a bunch of the students from Mwenge. They all said we looked alike, only Miranda is "so white and shiny!"

The two of us took a bus north to Arusha, a town near Mt. Kilimanjaro. From there we did a four-day safari, which was a lot of fun. We visited three different parks: Lake Manyara National Park, Serengeti National Park, and Ngorongoro Conservation Area. They were all beautiful yet surprisingly different from one another.

Serengeti landscape

We started out in Lake Manyara. It's much more forested than I had expected, though when you get down near the lake, it flattens out quite a bit. In the forest we saw tons of monkeys, and down by the water we saw everything from giraffes to elephants and warthogs to hippos. The coolest part was that the edge of the lake was covered with hundreds of flamingos! It was pretty amazing to see the water covered in a layer of pink.

Next we drove through Ngorongoro to the Serengeti. On the way there, a baboon stole one of our lunches. We were in a parking lot at the gate and everyone else had gotten out to stretch their legs. I was still chillin' in the car, and when I looked up there was a baboon in the front seat grabbing at our food. Of course, all I could think of was to yell "Hey! Wait! Come back!" Alas, he didn't listen and we were short one lunch.

Unlike Lake Manyara, the Serengeti is totally flat. It's almost entirely open savanna except for a few bushes here and there. Since it's the dry season, everything is golden. The first day we saw a group of lions on the other side of a small river chowing down on a delicious wildebeest. On the way back to the campsite, we ran into more lions that were right next to our car; I probably could have reached out the window and played with one of the cute, very non-ferocious looking cubs, but I decided against it.

Lions in the Serengeti

The next day we drove to the western edge of the Serengeti to see part of the annual wildebeest/ zebra migration. It's the dry season, so thousands of animals migrate north toward the Maasai Mara in Kenya before returning to Tanzania in the fall when the rains start again. The zebra must be a little quicker (or slower) than the wildebeest because what we saw were hundreds of wildebeest on either side of the road. It was pretty amazing; there was an endless herd running toward the road. They would narrow down to single file to cross the road then fan out again on the other side. During the wet season, many of the wildebeest come to the Serengeti to have wildebeest babies, so there were tons of wobbly calves running around as well.

We also saw large herds of zebra, though they didn't seem to be in such a hurry. They were just hanging around big grassy areas eating. The Serengeti definitely seems to be the place to spot cool animals. Other than lions, zebra, and wildebeest, we saw hippo, buffalo, elephants, crocodiles, etc. On the way out of the park, we also saw lions in love (it's baby-making season).

Finally we bactracked to Ngorongoro. Ngorongoro is really interesting for a few different reasons. It is dominated by a large crater than was once a huge volcano but has since collapsed. Beyond the crater, the land is similar to that of the Serengeti- flat, golden, and grassy, though there are some mountains in the distance. Around the crater, things are much more lush and green, and the walls of the crater are a beautiful mix of greens and blues. When we were there, it was cloudy, but this made for some cool effects when the sun shone through little pockets in the clouds, highlighting certain places within the crater. It's a beautiful place with tons of wild animals. We saw buffalo, zebra, hyenas, more love-lions, a cheetah, lots of flamingos, and even a black rhino off in the distance.

Wildebeest in Ngorongoro Crater

The other cool thing about Ngorongoro is that it isn't a national park so people are allowed to live traditionally within the conservation area. The people that live there are all Maasai. It's interesting to see these people living in the non-park park just as they did before colonial days. I can't imagine what it's like having q giraffe in my back yard and chasing lions away from my cattle. Katie is up there now doing an archaeological dig. She said that about a month ago, a Maasai man killed a lion with a bow and arrow after it ate two of his goats. They then cut the lion open and ate the goat meat out of its stomach (apparently it's not good luck to eat the lion itself). This has to be the closest people will ever get to living with the dinosaurs...!

After our short stint in the North, Miranda and I headed to Zanzibar. We were laying on a beautiful beach for a few days and are now in Stonetown exploring the narrow streets and tasting the delicious street food. It's our first time travelling alone together, and It's been a lot of fun. Tanzania isn't exactly a place that she would typically choose to travel, so she's really stepping out of her comfort zone, which is great. After her being away at boarding school and me being away at college, it's nice to have some sisterly bonding time.

A nice Zanzibar sunset