February 3

After breakfast at Ndutu, we departed for the central Serengeti. Timing was impossible to estimate - what we thought was a 2 hour drive turned into 4. But we're getting used to that :)

We're staying at the Serengeti Serena Lodge tonight - AMAZING. It has the most amazing view over the Serengeti, and a great pool! We only did one game drive and only the "keeners" participated (3 people - me included). We figured this would be our only game drive on the true Serengeti plains, so we'd best take advantage of it! We didn't see very much, probably because we were too busy killing Tsetse flies! We saw baboon, hippo, Topi (an antelope I've never heard of before but is really quite stunning), some hartabeast, impala, wildebeest, and mating Cape Buffalo! That was... interesting.

We had been warned the Tsetse flies were bad around the area, so we we were ready. Insect repellant lotion all over our bodies, hats, longsleeved shirts, pants, socks, shoes. The jerks STILL got through our clothing and bit a couple of us. So, we got smarter than the flies. We would take turns on "kill duty". 2 people would take pictures, one would kill tsetse flies. We'd switch every 5 minutes or so. Thanks to Tilley (we used my hat as the killing machine), we got every Tsetse who dared fly into our vehicle. I'm sure Rashid, our guide, had to sweep out his truck after.

Trent and I don't have much planned for tonight, because we have to get up so early for the hot air balloon ride tomorrow! We're so excited. The amount of rain this area has seen is amazing (they haven't seen this much rain since 1998), some of the roads are completely washed out, so we'll see if the hot air balloon ride even happens tomorrow.