July 6, 2005

Our game drive was started with an elephant setting. No matter how often we say, "No more elephant pictures!" we always seem to change our minds. Today's pack had some young babies. We saw other babies today as well. There were five baby giraffes in one herd and of course there were more adorable baboon babies hitching rides on their mother's backs. They look as though they were riding a horse, sitting upright in a saddle.

We watched a "mini-stampede" of zebras to a watering hole. It was comical as they would approach the hole and then quickly scurry away as if spooked by something.

At the rest stop we saw rocky hyrax for the first time and were amazed to find that they are closely related to the elephant. They only weigh about 2 pounds.

We saw an ostrich up close and learned that the reason for his neck being so red is because it is mating season.

Our guide had received a radio call that there were three cheetahs feasting on a gazelle in the area. By the time we arrived the cheetah were gone but there were many vultures and storks around scavenging the leftovers.

After leaving here it was only a few minutes latter that we happened to find a mother cheetah and her male offspring sitting under a tree. They were very close (only about 10 feet away from us). We sat and watched them as they sat and watched a herd of gazelle.

We ran into another pride of lions and circled some of the kopjes looking for other critters. We did see some reedbuck and a serval cat.

As we were returning to our lodge for lunch Susan spotted a female lion eyeing the zebras. As I was getting my camera ready she ducked down into some grass to resume her hiding. It was hard to believe that 15 feet away from us was a lion but we could not see her at all.

Also on our way back we saw a couple of schools of hippos. At the second school they were standing up in the water and appeared to be yawning and I was able to capture these big beasts with their mouths open on video. I was just getting ready to shut the camera off when two of them started making terrible noises. Before we knew it there was a huge fight between the two of them as they were apparently scuffling over a territorial issue, Andrew told us that this was a serious fight and that sometimes they result in the death of one of the hippos. The price of the video again just went up!

Our afternoon drive was eventful as they all have been. We saw vultures and marabou storks tearing apart a wildebeest carcass. We also went to a hippo pool where we were allowed to get out. We watched for quite awhile while they snorted, blew bubbles and opened their giant mouths. Also at this same stop was a giant Nile crocodile at least 12 feet long.

We stopped at one more site where there was a dead baby hippo in the water and there were at least two giant crocs trying to eat it.

We saw a huge herd of migrating wildebeest in a large open plain preparing to settle in for the night. There was a great-clouded sunset as we headed to our lodge.

We got ready for dinner and walked to the dining room using our flashlights. As we approached we heard the croaks of toads in a pond and commented that we had not heard them the night before.

We walked into the bar and immediately a man came in to get his friend saying that there was a Cape buffalo outside. We went out to check and sure enough it was drinking out of the toad pond. We must have walked within feet of it on our way in but due to its black skin and the darkness of the night we did not see it. A second one came along a few minutes later. These are very dangerous animals and a guard with a gun came up to the gawkers and told them to go inside. Some people did not obey the order and stayed around even taking flash pictures.

After dinner a guard came out to escort us back to our room as he had done the previous night. We asked if the buffalo was gone and he said yes. We asked him where they went and he signaled in the same direction as our room!

We went out onto our patio and to look at the millions of stars shining down on the Serengeti.