East Africa 2012 - Serengeti

East Africa 2012 – Photo Safari to Kenya and Tanzania

February 7 – 9, Serengeti National Park

Serengeti Sopa Lodge

It took three flights to get us from Little Governors’ Camp on the Mara in southern Kenya to the Serengeti in Tanzania. First we stopped in Kisumu to check out of Kenya and have our passports stamped. Then there was a short flight to Musoma in Tanzania where we went through an almost empty airport to the passport control area to be checked in. Last was the flight west to the Serengeti National Park. For me, the flights weren’t that pleasant because of some congestion, my ears would not clear. It took two more days for me to hear normally.

It was almost two before we arrived at the Serengeti Sopa Lodge where we had stayed two years ago. It is a nice large modern lodge in a good location. Lunch was the first thing on our minds and then we had a little time to settle in to our spacious rooms before heading out on the afternoon game drive.

The biggest change we noticed was that the migration of zebra and wildebeest was all around us instead of farther south as it had been in 2010. There were many, many thousands of animals and they seemed to bed down among the trees at night. In the morning they moved, in mass, usually running and kicking up lots of dust. It was absolutely awesome to be in the middle of this annual migration.

There were also lions, many of them in various prides. It is rare for lions to climb trees, but we came across one pride that seemed to have mastered the skill.

On our second afternoon at the lodge many of us chose to opt out of the game drive to download pictures, enjoy the swimming pool and just rest.

After two nights at the Sopa Lodge we left on the 9^th for a full day drive south across the Serengeti to our next destination. The vastness of the Serengeti was observable, with not much more than flat grassland as far as the eye can see. 

The Serengeti is peppered with large unusual rock formations called Kopjes (pronounced co-peas). As we passed them we sometimes saw lions sunning themselves on the rounded rocks or cheetah walking among them. We stopped at one Kopje to eat our boxed lunch, but were shortly called away by one of our other vehicles that had come across some cheetah eating a kill.

Photo by Jack Swenson

A mother cheetah and large cub were eating something and we watched for a while. Soon the chance for some shade was too enticing and the cub, then the mother came over to rest in the shade of OUR vehicle. For pictures this meant pulling out the camera with the wider-angle lens.

The vultures guarded the kill until the cheetahs decided to leave us and go back to eating.

We continued the long drive which included a stop at the Naabi Hill Gate where the drivers did the paperwork for entry to the Ngorongoro Crater area .

It was late afternoon when we arrived at the Lake Ndutu area and the Lake Masek Tented Camp that would be our home for the next three nights.

 

That's it for now. Grace and Paul