Goodnight.....

So, I've finally updated all of our days here in Kenya and Tanzania. I hope you enjoy the reading - sorry if it got wordy :)

It's past 7:30 now, so it's time for dinner!

We have one more night here at Ndutu and then one last night in Africa at another lodge. Trent and I are looking forward to our hot air balloon ride over the serengeti before we have to make the trek home. This will most likely be my last entry, I'm not sure if the next lodge has internet access.

I hope you enjoy(ed) the reading, we'll see you all soon!

Animals We've Seen

I'm sure I'm going to miss something, but I'm going to try to list them all from my journal:

First, the mammals:

1. Topi
   
2. Rothschild Giraffe
3. Reticulated Giraffe
4. Maasai Giraffe
5. Grevy Zebra
6. Plains Zebra
7. Baboon
8. Warthog
9. Impala
10. Waterbuck
11. Spotted Hyena
12. Striped Hyena
13. Elephant
14. Cape Buffalo
15. Lion
16. Gerenuk
17. Leopard
18. Dik Dik
19. Grant's Gazelle
20. Thompson's Gazelle
21. Blue Sykes Monkey
22. Eland
23. Wildebeest
24. Black Backed Jackal
25. Golden backed Jackal
26. Hippo
27. Hartabeest
28. Steinbok
29. African Wildcat
30. Bat-Eared Fox
31. Rat

I'm POSITIVE I'm missing a lot of mammals........

And now for the birds (birders, please excuse the bad spelling, I think some words were lost in translation...)

1. Scared ibis
2. cattle eagret
3. marabou stork
4. black kyte
5. white-something kyte (that divebombed me!)
6. helmeted guinea fowl
7. vulturine guinea fowl
8. yellow necked spur fowl
9. white browed sparrow weaver
10. black faced sand grouse
11. white beared buffalo weaver
12. speckled mouse bird
13. yellow-billed hornbill
14. red-billed hornbill
15. secretary bird
16. abdomen stork
17. 4 kinds of vultures
18. greater flamingo
19. lesser flamingo
20. warblers
21. hoopoe's
22. blacksmith plover
23. snake eagle
24. donald's barbet (kind of looked like donald trump... bad hair day)
25. 2 banded courser
26. abyssynian roller
27. lilac breasted roller
28. other rollers
29. starlings
30. black wingled stilt
31. kestrel
32. ostrich
33. buzzard
34. morning dove
35. lark
36. cory bustard
37. fisher's lovebird
38. european stork
39. lappet-faced vulture
40. bateleur
41. marshall eagle
42. superb starling
43. dark chanting goshawk
44. eurasian roller

WOW. I know I've missed lots of birds, but those are all I could remember by the time I got back to my accommodations.

We saw quite a few lizards as well, but I don't know my lizards. Oh! We saw 2 green mamba's, too.

Week in Review?

Wow, what a time. We went to Buffalo Springs Reserve... google it, and you'll find stories of a lioness years ago that adopted an oryx baby (so neat!).

We visited TWO wonders of the world on this trip. The Serengeti is the 7th, and Ngorogoro Crater is the 8th wonder of the world. On my last trip I visited Victoria Falls, which is the 3rd. I'd love to see ALL of the wonders of the world.

We drove through the Ngorogoro Crater. It imploded years ago, and made a caldera. The grasses are rich in nitrogen, which is why the Wildebeest, Zebra, and Gazelle make such a trek every year - it's good food for the babies!

We visited an AIDS orphanage, where all the children living there had AIDS or AIDS-related illnesses, and had lost most, if not all of their family to the same ailments. Such a sad but inspiring day, those kids were awesome.

I negotiated for something for Trent at a market in Karatu - an old Maasai leather skirt. He wanted over $200 for it, and I got him down to $50. So far it has stayed in its plastic bag, it reeks! It will eventually end up on a wall in Trent's office.

In parts of the Ngorogoro crater, there were umbrella acacia trees as far as the eye can see.

And on the Serengeti plains? Wildebeest, Zebra, and Gazelle as far as the eye can see! So many that you couldn't determine individual animals in binoculars.

The count for Lion is up to the late-30s for the whole group. For me, it's around 27. AWESOME. 2 Leopard, 9 Cheetah. *drooling* I can't get enough of this place.

Oh - something to note, but I don't know if it's worth comment. In our travels to Kenya, I saw a store named "The Steem Place Hotel and Butchery".

*blink blink*

I got kissed by a giraffe.

I met "my" elephant.

I had to go for a bathroom break on a long roadtrip somewhere... the guide announced "boys on the left, girls on the right". Well, I had to wander a little ways to find a bush to hide behind (those darned plains!) and found myself 10 feet away from a large herd of Zebra. When I got back to the car I was so excited, I said "I just peed with the Zebra!" - I'm such a dork. But it was a lot of fun. They were all looking at me like "what the heck are YOU!?" Now, if it were wildebeest or cape buffalo, I wouldn't have stayed there. But the Zebra seemed not to mind my interruption.

I found out that the Samburu people are similar to the Maasai, but judging only by the 2 villages we visited, the Samburu people we met were in much better health.

There is a higher police presence in Kenya.

I peed on a wasp nest and they all escaped between my legs!! (too much information?!)

Oh, so many great moments (not that peeing on a wasp nest was a great moment, but it was memorable!), we can't wait to share them all.

I took over 1,000 pictures. 4-512MB, 1-2GB, 2-256MB cards. I only took that many because we had the Ipod upload them to, and I am grateful for it!!

We'll see you soon!

February 3

WOW was today amazing. We finally found Cheetah. And not just one, but THREE!

We started out at 6:15 this morning with plans to have a boxed breakfast on the plains. We drove for quite a while before we saw any animals, but then it seemed to be one after another. We didn't end up having breakfast until noon, it was just such an exciting morning.

We saw 2 Cheetah, a mother and son, lounging in the brush. We watched them for quite a while and I used up yet another memory card on my digital camera. 2 of the 3 vehicles raced away which left my vehicle still watching the cheetah, and wondering what the heck was going on. Our guide (John) received a phone call from one of the other guides (Rasheed or Justin) telling him about a Hyena kill in progress. John asked if we wanted to go over there, or stay with the Cheetah - 3 women in the vehicle and Trent, Trent lost the vote, and we stayed with the Cheetah for a few more minutes.

When we got to the Hyena kill, the Wildebeest was dead - thank god. I don't mind seeing an animal being consumed, but I want it to be already dead when I get there. I guess the other 2 vehicles saw it - and heard it. We have a ton of great but gruesome pictures of the hyena devouring her wildebeest kill, and the vultures coming in to clean up the scraps.

We tried to find the 2 Cheetah from before, but couldn't locate them, so we decided to have a group photo and have breakfast.

We didn't get back from our morning drive until 2:30. 3 of us "keeners" left for an afternoon drive at 4:30 and we just returned at 7:00. It's been a busy but awesome day! We didn't see much on the afternoon drive, a lot of birds, some giraffe, wildebeest, zebra, impala, gazelle.

I have a little bit of a sunburn, but other than that, it was a fantastic day. Trent was also very glad he came along on the morning drive, he wanted to see a kill (weird boy).

It's currently 7:15 and dinner starts soon, so I'd best type quickly! One of the guys in the office just came out and said "do you know how annoying it is to hear you typing so quickly, and I'm in my office doing the hunt-and-peck for a letter?!" - I told him I could be contracted out, but he didn't take me up on it.

SO! What have we seen today?

Marshall's Eagle, Tawny Eagle, Bush snail (so cute!), zebra, dik dik, marabou stork, 2 banded courser, hartabeest, black winged stilt, european stork, plovers, snake eagles, chanting goshawks, bustards, secretary bird, starling, LION, giraffe, grants gazelle, bateleur, cheetah, fisher's lovebirds, hyena, wildebeest, hippo, franklins, lilac breasted rollers, helmeted guinea fowl, vulturine guinea fowl, long crested eagle, blacksmith plover...... and WOW so much more.

I'm looking forward to sitting by the fire tonight with a rum and coke. I can't believe it's my second last night in Africa....... I've met many people who visisted Africa once, fell in love with it, and moved here. The 2 owners of this lodge, for instance. I can understand that.

February 2

After trying for about 30 minutes ($30) on another computer, I finally gave up and asked to use an office computer. So, here I am updating our days.

Today was another day spent searching for Cheetah, but to no avail! It seems everyone else at Ndutu has seen them but us - and more than once! One lady sees them DAILY, and has seen 2 kills. I must say, though, the sightings we've had of lion have been out of this world. Lion - every day, at least one new pride.

It's absolutely amazing here. I can see why Les says it's his favourite place, I think it is mine as well. I could do without all these nasty black flies, though! The only drawback is not having any plug-ins in our room. So we can't recharge camera batteries, and I can't use my hairdryer. But, I'm getting used to it, and actually quite like my hair sans style :)

We've gone out for 2 drives today - the AM one left at 6:15 and was back for lunch. The afternoon drive left at 4:00 and was back at dinner. It was a very busy day for birds, giraffes, lions, wildebeest - and 2 exciting sightings: a bat-eared fox, and an african wildcat!!!! Very rare.

Trent didn't come on either drive, he's feeling some G.I. problems (3 cheers for Cipro/antibiotics) and he's not a fan of all the black flies. Unfortunately for him, they weren't that bad on either drive!

Evening........

Trent is feeling better and will probably go on the AM drive tomorrow. I hope the flies aren't too bad, they're really getting annoying. They seem to like the taste of DEET.

But.... try to imagine the feeling of driving around in the Serengetti, looking around and realizing you're the only soul out there. Not another vehicle, not any sounds of civilization. Just the sounds and smells of thousands of animals. At one point there were migrating wildebeest, gazelle, and zebra as far as the eye could see, from one side of the horizon to the other. It was absolutely awe-inspiring!!!

I'm quickly running out of camera juice, because I have to leave my whole camera at the bar to be recharged... I don't want to leave it alone, so I have to take it with me at bedtime. It only gets about 2 hours of charge per day.

It was a tiring day today, but a good one. When we got back from the afternoon drive, we all had a drink and some amazing tasting salty popcorn before dinner. Dinner was fantastic - spaghetti!!! We'll see what tomorrow brings. I can't believe our trip is almost over.... I don't want to leave!