Ngorongoro and the Serengeti

Once we left the outskirts of Arusha heading towards the national parks and we had left the coffee growing area behind the locals reverted to traditional Masai dress. Although fashion and tradition vary from area to area it was explained to us that the father of the house wore black and red check (think tartan) red blanket with long hair denoting warrior status, the black with an ostrich feather post circumcision but not yet a warrior. (whole feather someone who had been circumcised like a true Masai, cut feather one who had cried or otherwise behaved in an un warrior like way) The women were equally structured the mothers wearing a maroon cloak the other ranks differentiated by style and quantity of jewelry.
Ngorongoro crater was spectacular we camped overlooking it but didn’t venture into the crater itself preferring to keep the US$200 for the Serengeti at US$50 per day.

The public camp sites were fine and at this time of year fairly empty. Although Bruce who went off to fetch wood in the dark fell over a zebra. Incidentally the Masai word for Serengeti is Siringitu meaning literally the land that goes on for ever. It does.
We saw the most unbelievable range of animals, lion

and we watched them on a kill

elephant, a solitary bad tempered bull.

and lots of family groups, zebra in their thousands.

wildebeest again in their thousands, giraffe… one who was fascinated by our van and very nearly stuck its head in through the sun roof which we had removed for better game viewing, buffalo.

hippo in and out of the water,


their ears like little satellite dishes , crocodile cruising like prehistoric submarines, countless antelope of different types and birds in their millions. Not to mention the tsetse fly when we got close to zebra.
The dirt roads weren’t that challenging but we lost a rubber stop on our suspension and had a new one manufactured out of the tyre of an earth mover!

African ingenuity at its best.