10-4 Slowly into the Serengeti

What a great soundtrack to our first night at the Simba lodge. We could hear the wildebeest grunting and somewhere in the middle of the night, something roared. In the morning we heard the birds singing. So cool.

Our first adventure in the Serengeti started slowly. Literally. Cosmos drove into the park so slowly that we were constantly being passed by other cruisers. It wasn’t because he was pointing out interesting things along the way so I can’t imagine his rationale. We turned in our entrance pass and started into the park, where we saw a huge assemblage of zebras and wildebeest. It would have made a great photo, but we just passed by it. The roof hadn’t been raised, so there was no way to get a good photo through the window. Then we saw some kind of tiny monkey, but again Cosmos neither commented or stopped. Bye-bye little monkeys, whoever you are. After about 20 minutes Cosmos stopped to point out a spotted hyena asleep in the grass under a tree. We continued crawling down the road with the squawk of the radio that connects the drivers, kind of like a CB radio.

We pulled up alongside about 8 other cruisers. Apparently there was a lioness, but the other cruisers were in front of us so we waited about 10 minutes for them to move a got a quick look at her.

We drove another 20 minutes or so and saw two hippos in the river, really close to the road that turned off from the road we were on. I was finally so exasperated I said something to Bruce who asked Cosmos if we could go back and see them. Cosmos said no, that he had a better spot. We rounded the bend where a large gathering of cruisers was parked. Yes! A gathering in the river of countless hippos. There must have been over a hundred of them in the water. They have tiny little tails which they use to splash muddy water over their backs. Every now and then one would roll over and we could see their massive pink bellies. All of this was accompanied by the occasional grunt. So cool!

We drove on very slowly and saw a lion in the field along with a small herd of elephants. No stopping, though.

The thing about the Serengeti is that it’s massive – twice as big as the Masai Mara and there are strict rules about sticking to the roads and not veering into the bush. Consequently, it takes binoculars to get a decent look at anything. And if one is to see much, a certain sense of urgency, or at least going faster that 20 kpm is necessary. Countless other land cruisers flew past us all day. It felt like we were out for a Sunday drive with granny.

A bit further down the road we caught up to a group of cruisers and saw a group of lionesses resting under a tree .

Further on we saw another lioness under a tree, well, sort of saw her, as she was in the tall grass. Then we headed to the spot where the offices of the balloon companies are located to have lunch. Cosmos arranged for the hotel to give us a hot lunch, not a boxed lunch, so we had a fairly massive feast of rice, chana dal, salad and a chicken stew. Coffee was available and there was bottled water. While there we stopped at the balloon company with which our tour operator had booked a hot air balloon flight for us for the following day. We filled out our paperwork and got the briefing on how tomorrow would go. We’ll be aloft for an hour. So it’s here that I have to say that I have a bit of a fear of heights. The thought of doing this fills me with a mixture of delight and dread. But here I am in Africa presented with this opportunity so silly not to, really.

While we were having our lunch we watched a bunch of mongoose maneuvering around the tables in hopes of picking up a dropped morsel or two.

Suddenly, a little monkey leapt up on a table, grabbed a piece of pineapple and tore across the picknick grounds. He climbed to the top of the roof of the balloon offices and had a lovely little snack.

Bruce bought a great T-shirt, “Only elephants should wear ivory.” We looked around unsuccessfully for Cosmos, so gave up and sat on a wall in the shade. After a while he appeared and we started off again. By this time the temperature was hovering around 90 and we had pretty much had enough, so we told Cosmos that we’d like to make it back to the lodge somewhere around 3:00. I also told him that, while I appreciated the fact that the guides want to be sure to show the clients the big cats, I really loved all the animals and would like to be able to, perhaps, see the wildebeests and zebras. He seemed a bit disappointed, but stopped to let us see a couple of giraffes and the aforementioned wildebeests and zebras.

We made it back to the hotel and I was so covered in dust that I stepped into the outdoor shower clothes and all. I washed some more clothes then Bruce and I headed to the lodge for a G&T. We must be packed and ready to leave tomorrow at 4:00, so I decided to skip dinner, get the packing done and head to dreamland early.

Because I’ve been having body image issues, I ordered an old lady bathing suit from Land’s End. It’s pretty awful, but covers a multitude of sins. It also weighs about 3 pounds because of the 2 layers of fabric. I didn’t swim at the first lodge, nor the second, nor here, so I decided to donate it to the lodge and free up a huge amount of space in our limited luggage.

Oh, great. An email from Sylvester saying that the balloon company turned down his company credit card and can we please pay for it ourselves and he will reimburse us. Feeling very torn. It would be a great experience, but one of the selling points of this tour was the fact that it was included in the price if we booked before the end of the year (which we did.) Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.