Ngorongoro Crater

After another early morning start, an uneventful ferry crossing back from Zanzibar and a very long drive, we arrived at Snake Park near Arusha. Luckily the snakes live in a sanctuary next door rather than the actual campsite, although we were still extra careful to zip up our tent doors.














Arusha was our departure point for a two night safari into the Ngorongoro Crater and the Serengeti National Park. As the road into the crater would be very challenging for old Doris (the truck), we bundled into a smaller safari vehicle for the journey. After stocking up on supplies in town, we headed west towards Ngorongoro, stopping briefly for a spectacular view over Lake Manyara. This gave a small hint of what was yet to come, with glimpses of giraffe and wildebeest in the distance. We spent the night at Karatu camp where we had luxury of having some else prepare our dinner.














Next morning at dawn we packed up camp and left for Ngorongoro. From the park gates you start the climb through the tropical forest covered sides of the crater. From the top you get stunning views of the lush crater below. We were also just about able to make out vast herds of wildebeest which became increasingly impressive as we descended down steep inner walls.

The crater, which is approximately 20km wide, is the result of a volcanic eruption around 2.5 million. It has a staggeringly high concentration of animals with pretty much everything you would hope to see, with the exception of giraffe which apparently are unable to climb up the very step outside walls of the crater on their spindly legs.














True to the reputation, after gawking at the herds of wildebeest, buffalo, and zebra we found our first mammal, a sickly looking hyena. Luckily, ten minutes later a much healthier specimen walked right past our van. This was swiftly followed by our first lion sighting of the day – a beautiful lioness, who nonchalantly wandered between the several safari vehicles which swept in on her. Within the hour we had found another lion, this time an elderly male, lounging lazily in the sun.














Our luck was clearly in, as twenty minutes later, we found a pride of lions (at least two females and two males). One of the lionesses was stalking two warthog. After, an intense eight minutes or so of stalking, she made her attack, only to be outrun by the nifty warthog. Quite impressive to see such a powerful cat outmanoeuvred by a mere warthog, but potentially she was only practising, and according to our guide lions only have a 10% success rate in their attempted kills.














After a quick stretch of the legs at the hippo pool, we continued on our drive. In addition to the lions, we also saw a couple of elephants, got a distant glimpse of a black rhino, had a close encounter with a jackal and successfully defended our lunch against a troupe of very pesky monkeys. Not bad for a morning's work.