Going on Safari

Saturday, July 21, & Sunday, July 22, 2012

We woke early Saturday morning, ate breakfast, and headed for the park.  There was a slight delay in us being admitted to the park due to some miscommunication with the money and our number of people, but our guide and the park rangers worked it all out and we didn’t wait long. 

Eating breakfast at the lodge before heading out

Working out the logistics at the park entrance

Ruaha National Park: The Largest Park in East Africa

Forrest, me, Maria, and Ashley getting ready to go on safari!  It was cool in the morning but got much hotter in the afternoon under the African sun.  Ruaha is at a much lower elevation than Pommern.  (Photo by Rachel)

As soon as we got into the park, our guide told us, “Sorry, but we’re going to go fast to find some cheetahs.”  Dude, no need to apologize!  Normally they take the drive nice and slow so they can spot things to show us, but the cheetah was an animal I hadn’t seen in the wild before and I was excited.  We ended up seeing a pair of lions and a couple other things on our way to the cheetah — it was pretty neat to see lions first thing in our day.  

The two female lions we saw to start off our day — rawr!

As we approached the cheetah’s location, the first thing I noticed was a spot in the grass that was red and bloody.  Then I saw the cheetah.  He was standing near a dead impala, which he had clearly killed very recently. Unfortunately, our vehicle’s brakes were extremely loud and squeaky, and our approach scared the cheetah.  He took off running just a few moments after we got there.  Bummer.  The other half of our group had gotten to the cheetah before we did and were already there when we arrived.  They reported later that they didn’t see the kill, but they did get to watch the cheetah tear a leg off the impala and eat it.

Evidence of a recent kill

Cheetah!!  (The only picture I captured of him before he took off.)

The dead impala.  Poor thing.

One of Amy's photos showing the cheetah enjoying a meal of impala.

Nothing the rest of the day was quite as exciting as the cheetah, but we saw a huge variety of animals and had a fantastic time.  Our animal sightings in the morning were frequent and good.  We stopped for lunch around 1:30, and then there were a couple of hours of really hot weather and not nearly as many animals.  By about 4:30 it started to get cooler though, and that was nice.  The air is very dry here this time of year, so it cools down quickly when the sun starts to go down. 

Safari is a Swahili word (one of the few we have adopted into our English vocabulary) meaning journey, and the best way to tell you about our journey is to show you.  So come along with me on a photo safari!

Female kudu, a type of antelope 

Yellow-billed stork

Giraffe — my favorite animal!

You can see how close we were to the animals in this shot looking over Ashley's shoulder.

The African landscape.  Beautiful!  The fruit of the palm trees is known as dupalm fruit.  Both baboons and elephants eat it.  Baboons climb the trees to retrieve the fruit, whereas elephants shake the trees to make the fruit fall to the ground.

The official name of this tree is kigelia, but it is affectionately known as a sausage tree.  The fruit looks like a sausage but is poisonous to humans.  One sausage fruit can weigh up to 15 kg.  Note to self: don't fall asleep underneath this tree!

This is a candelabra tree.  Its sap causes blindness if it gets into your eye.  Note to self: don't fall asleep underneath this tree either!

Vervet monkey (a.k.a. black-faced monkey), high in the tree

I'm not much of a bird watcher, but we saw some really beautiful ones, including this lilac-breasted roller.

Female impala with two of her young

Another pretty bird — a type of starling

The other jeep ahead of us on the trail, and a baobab tree

Vervet monkey hanging out on the ground

A francolin — a type of bird that is largely terrestrial, though not flightless

Me hanging out on the back of the jeep for a better photography angle.  (Photo by Rachel)

Two male impalas getting a little feisty.

Elephant!  Did you know that elephants keep cool by fanning themselves with their large floppy ears? 

Looking over Rosemary's shoulder to show how close we were to the elephant.

Rachel with an elephant behind her — yes, we were really there!

Another giraffe.  The Swahili word for giraffe is twiga...and giraffes have twig-like legs.  I love languages.

Just proving once again that we were actually there!

Warthog in the distance.  They're not nearly as cute as Pumba from The Lion King.

Taking a break...and some photos with the beautiful African plain in the background.

This giraffe lost its tail in a lion attack.  Compare to a typical giraffe tail in the 4th picture back.

Baboons helping each other by picking insects out of each other's fur.

A mama baboon carrying a very young baboon, who is clutching onto its mama's tummy.

ADORABLE young baboon sitting on a sausage fruit!  Luckily the sausage fruit didn't fall on him!

A baboon and an elephant eyeing each other cautiously.

Close-up of a giraffe.  

Impalas, zebras, and giraffes all chillin' together.

A male and 2 female impala heading for the water.

Well, if the earlier picture was of two impala getting feisty, then this is of two impala getting frisky.  It's all part of nature!

Zebras!  Literally called "striped donkeys" in Swahili (punda milia).

Another striped donkey. 

Saddle-billed stork

A lion hanging out on some large rocks.

Cape buffalo — one of Africa's 5 most dangerous animals.  (The others are lions, rhinos, elephants, and leopards.)

Several cape buffalo, part of a decent-sized herd we saw.

A male kudu — note his awesome horns

We were super-close to this lion.  She was perturbed by some people who were out of their vehicle not too far away.  Silly humans.

Now she has calmed down a bit.

And this is a close-up of her.  My cousin commented on this photo on Facebook and told me: "National Geographic called.  They want their photos back!"

Waterbuck

A male lion — he was also perturbed by those people out of their vehicle.

A closer shot of the male lion.  He looks vicious.  Probably because he is. 

Mama elephant and CUTE little baby elephant

A large group of elephants carefully crossing the water.  They have to be careful of hippos.  A hippo can easily kill a small elephant.

Vultures 

A closer shot of an elephant

Jackal

Hippo

Hippo

A crocodile, hiding mostly below the surface of the water.

Rachel and me, safely high above the hippo- and crocodile-infested waters below.

Sunset at Ruaha National Park.  Gorgeous!

All in all, it was a really good day despite the heat of midday and despite the far-too-short sighting of the cheetah.  We stayed in the park until the sun was almost set and got back to the lodge at about 7:00.  Darkness was falling, and I had a quick shower before dinner at 7:30.  It was the most amazingly wonderful shower I’ve ever had though, and the water was even HOT — yay!  Dinner was cream of vegetable soup, a mandazi-like thing, rice, pasta, deep-fried beef (what??), and fruit salad.  There was enough time for me to write a quick journal entry before exhaustion took over and it was time for sleep.

*     *     *     *     *

Sunday morning we slept in a little and got up at 8:30 to eat breakfast at 9:00, and we were on the road shortly after 10.  We arrived in Iringa just before 12:30 to do some souvenir shopping and use the Internet.  Rachel and I visited a Maasai market, where I bought several things and got to have my picture taken with a Maasai woman.  

I'm wearing a Maasai necklace I'd purchased and two bracelets the woman had given me as a gift.  It's not uncommon for a shopowner in Tanzania to give a free bonus gift to a patron who has bought several things at his/her store.  Usually it means we probably paid too much for what we bought in the first place, but the prices are so low anyway that one can hardly complain.

Then we headed to a Lutheran Guest Centre to eat our boxed lunches from Tungamalenga before getting back on the road again around 2:45.  We arrived back in Pommern around 4:15 and later learned that Edward had been concerned about us because usually groups return from Ruaha by 1:00 or 2:00.  We certainly didn’t mean to worry him!

My sun shower was very warm when we returned, but the vast majority of my water had leaked out.  It still felt good to get clean though after the dusty ride, and there was just enough water for me to get by.  We also played outside with the kids and got to use our cameras for the first time in Pommern.  (We’re asked not to use them for the first three days so that we know people in the community before we start taking pictures of them.)  I showed some of the kids pictures and videos from two years ago, which they enjoyed seeing.

Supper was rice, kuku (chicken), green beans, greens, and guacamole.  The kuku was in honor of our returning from our trip.  In Tanzanian culture, meat (chicken anyway) is only served for special occasions.  We spent the evening going through some donations for the clinic which we would deliver on Monday and doing our normal relaxing, visiting, game playing, and journal writing until the generator went off at 10:00 and it was time for bed.  A good weekend indeed, but I was eager to get back to the school and especially to get to do some more teaching in the classroom in the week to come!