Tanzania 7

Tags

Baobab, elephant, grey-headed kingfisher, Helmeted guinea fowl, leopard tortoise, lilac-breasted roller, Masai giraffe, Pygmy falcon, Superb starling, Tanzania, Tarangire National Park, Tarangire Safari Lodge, Tawny eagle, vervet monkey, Von der Decken's hornbill, White-headed buffalo weaver, yellow-collared lovebird

Tarangire National Park.  How’s this for a view from your accommodation?

Next morning was Wednesday 17th February.  Actually, I think I’ll just let these pictures, taken during our morning outing, speak for themselves.  Suffice to say that if I had been sad not to have seen many elephants before this, these two days in Tarangire National Park more than made up for it – though you can never have too many elephants.

These are baobab trees. They store enormous amounts of water in their ‘trunks’, and can be centuries old.

Tawny eagles

Helmeted guinea fowl

White-headed buffalo weaver

Lilac-breasted roller

Yellow-collared lovebirds

Von der Decken’s hornbill

Superb starling

Pygmy falcons

Vervet monkey at breakfast stop, one of many such to ‘greet’ us

Wistful? Melancholy? No, pondering what mischief he can next get up to!

Leopard tortoise

Focus on foreground!

Sand bath

Grey-headed kingfisher

 

Tanzania 4

Tags

Cokes hartebeest, giraffe, Grantj's gazelle, hornbill, Hyena, Impala, lion cub, marabou stork, Ndutu, Shifting Sands, Tanzania, Thomson's gazelle, Von der Decken's hornbill, White stork, Wildebeest, zebra

The afternoon’s safari

Marabou storks

Thomson’s gazelle (with horizontal black stripe), Grant’s gazelle (without) and Impala (Tawny colour)

included observing how difficult it is for giraffes to drink,

How do giraffes drink? Inelegantly

Von der Decken’s hornbill

a herd of wildebeest and zebras migrating firstly alongside us and then crossing our path, many of the zebras stopping to drink, though not the wildebeest,

Cokes hartebeest

and an enchanting time again, as night fell, with some lions.  It took some while for us to realise just how many there were in the heap and in the bushes, but in the end we counted seven cubs and three lionesses.  A delightful moment was when one of the latter just went and lay down on top of the heap of cubs.

The next day, Monday 15th February, meant it was time to leave Ndutu and move on, or rather to retrace our path.  This involved a much sunnier drive across the plain than when we arrived, and some great wildlife moments: a spotted hyena washing its meat, dozens of white storks at a watering hole and wheeling in the sky (sorry, no decent picture of that), and baby Thomson’s gazelle and wildebeest.

White storks coming in to land

We also stopped at ‘Shifting Sands’, an isolated sand dune that moves under the effect of the wind, a most curious phenomenon.  Shortly afterwards we were out of the Park.

(Soon: Ngorogoro Crater)