Goodbye Africa

Here we are killing time in the hotel room before we leave for the airport tonight to begin our 27hr journey to Vancouver. I can say that I am looking forward to the snow back home! Hopefully the road conditions are good by the time we land as we will be picking up a gutless Evo (Toyota Prius) at the airport.

More about yesterday… We started our game drive at 6am and made our way down to the Ngorongoro crater. The road was steep and Dota our driver had to engage 4-wheel drive. The road down the crater is also what the elephants, wildebeests and zebras use to move in and out of the crater. The sunrise was just phenomenal!

As we approached the bottom of the crater we saw 4 male lions walking from the forest to the open field. We were the first vehicle there and by the time all the lions had made their way across there were at least 10 Land Cruisers jostling for a good view. All the guides share animal sightings on the radio and it’s not surprising to see them rush to a specific area.

The bottom of the crater is like a concentrated community of animals – we saw jackals, zebras, gazelles, wildebeests, hyenas, ostriches, elan, elephants, hippos, birds and the elusive rhino.

Our guide described the wildebeest as the spare parts animal. Tail like a horse, hind quarters like an antelope, front like a buffalo and face like a grasshopper… or something like that.

Many terms have been coined for safaris – the big five, the ugly five, tasty five, tiny five etc. The big five being the most popular that people strive to see – elephant, rhino, cape buffalo, leopard and lion. We managed to spot a pair a rhinoceros on our crater drive. Unfortunately they were a tad far but nevertheless we saw them to make the big five complete. Our guide said that we have been very lucky on this trip to see the big five as many people go home without seeing a rhino or even a leopard.

As for the hike up Kilimanjaro, we have also been pretty lucky. The weather was good and we had mostly clear skies especially on summit day. I suffered from AMS (acute mountain sickness) which is quite common given that I could not take diamox. I had to take ibuprofen a couple times. My lower lip doubled in size and I had swollen ankles and fingers. Jeff had no symptoms as he was on diamox. I think the hike up was like a stroll in the park for him! Anyways, the swelling has gone down substantially and we can’t wait to get home to breath in the clean air!

This has been a fun trip for us. This trip is to mark my milestone birthday year – Jeff’s gift to me. Thanks honey! (I guess I need to start saving for his milestone birthday year trip…)