In Conclusion...

To wrap up my posts on our trip to Africa, I will say that it was by far the best trip I have ever been on. The pain of the mountain climbing was awful, but the reward to stand at the top was well worth the pain. The safari was one of the coolest things I will probably do in my life. The entire trip was truly a once in a lifetime experience. I close the book on this incredible adventure with my Africa top 10 that I wrote in my journal during my two weeks in Tanzania:

1. Language is not a barrier here. Seems like almost everyone speaks English.
2. It is HHHHOOOOOTTTTTT here. (I have to comment on this. It was written the day we got to Africa and were in the smallest airport ever with no fans and about 100 people. Africa wasn't exactly cold by any means, it was certainly hot during the day. However when we were on the safari, I noticed it was VERY cool in the mornings and at night. Overall, weather wasn't too bad).
3. The local currency here is shillings. Today, 1,400 shillings = 1 US dollar. This currency changes everyday so purchasing something at a store one day will not be the same price the previous day or the next day. The changes are small but they account for exchange rate in all the stores. Most of them have signs by the registers that say the Shillings to Dollar rate for the day. Stuff here is so cheap! At the hotel, we get a 1.5 Liter of bottled water for $1 and we get a 16 oz. bottled coke for $1 too. At least our dollar is superior to something!
4. You drive on the left side of the road here. This is actually something I expected to see in Amsterdam, but it wasn't the case there. I would truly suck at driving here. There are little circles (similar to the ones at Patton Creek for those of you that live in BHM) you have to drive around and I would so turn the wrong way.
5. I've learned quite a bit of Swahili since I've been here. Our hotel guide, Anderson, taught us to say "no thank you " in Swahili, which is "hapana asante". We also learned "jambo", which means hello, "hakuna matata", meaning "no troubles" and so many others. Our guides that were with us on the mountain taught us a lot as did our safari guide, Stephen.
6. The cooking on the mountain is superb, except for the weird brand names of stuff here. Instead of "butter", we had "blue band" on the mountain. And the hot chocolate mix isn't called "hot chocolate", it's called "Milo". Strange.
7. Number 7 is probably going to be TMI for most of you, so skip it if you must.....It is absolutely 100% impossible to go 7 days without pooping. And pooping in a hole at this altitude is incredibly challenging.
8. People here are obsessed with Obama. It's the strangest thing. I mean, I understand it because of the obvious reasons, but there's so many Obama shirts, and Obama's picture is on EVERYTHING including billboards and tour buses. I would be pissed if I were Tanzania's president. Some of our porters had Obama clothing and umbrellas and kept saying "yes we can". Oh if they only knew...
9. I'm fairly confident that at a very young age, all Africans are required to take a class on how to balance large and heavy items on their heads without having to hold them.
10. Overall, everyone here is incredibly friendly. People always say "hello" to you and everyone we've been with has gone over and beyond to make us feel welcome and to make sure we have a good African experience.

Oh yeah....I did get my amazing Double Quarter Pounder with Cheese that I was daydreaming about for so long. Our flight from Kilimanjaro to Amsterdam got in at 9am. Justin and I immediately headed to the food court and got some McDonalds. I'm not a big fast food person. I only eat it on the rarest of occasions and it's usually while I'm traveling and don't really have a choice. However, I felt absolutely no remorse for digging into some McDonalds. It was the best meal I'd had in two weeks. When all was said and done, I'd lost five pounds while in Africa. Talk about a vacation :)

December 31, 2010 - Part II

To finish up the post I wrote on our travel day from Ndutu to Ngorogoro...

We left the Maasai village and drove a little over an hour into the Ngorogoro Crater. We saw a bunch of animals there...



Baby Zebra



We saw a bunch of Ostrich!



Flamingo as far as the eye can see.



Warthog eating some grass on his knees.



More African Cape Buffalo.



This video is actually from Ndutu, but I forgot to put it on the last post.



This lake is where we ate lunch. The lake was BEAUTIFUL! It had tons and tons of hippos in it, but we never saw more than their eyes and back coming out of the water. There were also a ton of birds at this lake. The guide said it was because all the people in the crater tend to eat here for lunch because of how beautiful it is. And that was totally right! There were birds all over the place trying to eat food that people dropped. It seemed like everyone that was in the crater was at this place for lunch.



While we were at lunch our safari guide heard that there was a pride of lions next to a bunch of wildebeest and zebras so we got in the truck and headed that way. The lions were REALLY close to the cars as you can see. They sure look like they're ready to pounce don't they?



This young male lion had his teeth out and started walking towards the herd of animals and we really all thought he was about to attack. There were four females strategically placed around the herd and crouched down low so we really thought that this was it and that we were gonna see a big chase that ended in a kill.



Justin and I dubbed this a "lion jam". In Gatlinburg, if you go around May when the bears come out of hybernation, they'll be all over the place and very easy to spot causing drivers going through the park to stop to watch and take pictures. The traffic jams that are created by this are referred to as "bear jams". So, as you can see in the picture above, watching for a kill caused quite the "lion jam".



We moved our car and ended up getting right behind the herd. I think this was right when they noticed the lions. See the female lion in the background? Needless to say, we didn't see a kill. We didn't even see a chase, unfortunately. None of the lions we saw during our entire trip were hungry. Boo!

After managing to get out of the "lion jam" we started heading for our hotel, the Ngorogoro Sopa Lodge. This lodge was much like the Serengeti Sopa Lodge because they had the same owner. Something I may have forgotten to mention is that everything in the Serengeti, Ndutu and Ngorogoro is run off of solar power. So we only had hot water in the morning and right before dinner. Any other time it was cold.



This is Justin walking to our room at the lodge. We were told that we would again have to be escorted to our rooms after dinner at night because buffalo and elephant had a tendency to visit the lodge.



Lodge pool that overlooks the crater



View of the back of the lodge



Our rooms. The rooms weren't as nice as the rooms at the Serengeti Sopa Lodge, but the bathroom was just as big and nice! When we got back to our rooms after dinner, the staff had come in and turned down our beds and given us heating pads. Sweet!



Sunset was absolutely beautiful. Justin and I got some cokes from the bar and sat in those rocking chairs on the back of the lodge and watched the sun set over the crater. It was gorgeous.

After watching sunset, we headed to the restaurant to meet everyone for New Year's Eve dinner, which was a buffet and was very good. I was actually able to eat a little more than usual, but I was still daydreaming about heading back to Amsterdam the next day so that I could go to McDonald's and get a Quarter Pounder with Cheese.

We didn't stay up late, in fact, I'm pretty sure we were in bed by 10. Still, I think that New Year's Eve 2010 may be hard to beat. How do you beat spending Christmas and New Year's in Africa??? I don't think it can be done.

The next morning we woke up and drove all the way back to Arusha (where we flew from to get to the Serengeti). We had lunch at the Arusha hotel and then hung around the hotel for several hours before getting back on the bus to head to the Kilimanjaro airport. By the way, while we were at the Arusha Hotel was when the KLM representative brought me my bag. As soon as we pulled up to the hotel he met me at the front door. He said "We're so sorry. You told us you'd be at the Keys Hotel in Moshi and that's why it took so long to get your bag to you". That just pissed me off. I had to correct him. I told him that we were at the Keys Hotel in Moshi...for friggin seven days!!! And we even told KLM (three different times) that we would be leaving Moshi to head on a safari. I was glad to have my bag back, but kind of pissed that he tried to blame it on me. So...I lost my bag on December 17, 2010 and didn't get it back until January 1, 2011. Ridiculous.

We got to Kili airport and waited around for another couple of hours before we were able to board the plane around 10pm. We got back into Amsterdam at 9am on January 2nd and the first thing we did was go to McDonalds. Best Quarter Pounder with Cheese I've ever had.

December 31, 2010

In case you didn't see the last post, I stopped doing entries in the journal after December 29, 2010. I just got too busy and was weak from not eating, which by the way, the stomach issues didn't go away the rest of the time while we were in Africa. Pretty much the only thing I could eat was bread. So I'm just writing on the blog the things I remember and putting up pictures, which, let's face it, the pictures are all anyone really wants to see anyway :)

December 31st will have to go into two posts. We did so much on this day and there's too many pictures to put in one post so I'll separate it into segments. The first segment is going to be our visit to the Maasai Village and tomorrow or sometime later in the weekend, I'll blog about Ngorogoro Crater.

After our night at the Ndutu Lodge, we woke up early on New Year's Eve and had breakfast at the Lodge. During breakfast we saw all the animals heading for the watering hole again. Great start to an awesome day! The goal for this day was to drive from Ndutu all the way into the Ngorogoro Crater, do a game drive in the crater, then drive up the rim of the crater to stay at our hotel for the night, the Ngorogoro Sopa Lodge. While in transit to Ngorogoro Crater, we were going to stop off at a Maasai Village. Maasai is a very old tribe that live in Kenya and Northern Tanzania. They have some CRAZY traditions. Wikipedia them whenever you can, you'll be shocked by what you read.



This is the view from their village.



This is the view of another Maasai village that we passed while driving to Ngorogoro. This is not the one we visited, but they all look very similar, so it gives you an idea.





By the way, the recurring theme you see in their clothing is shades of red. They wear this because they believe it scares lions away.





Maasai fun fact. They can JUMP. I think they have to learn how to jump this high when they're young, because all the men jumped in all the dances they did. We even saw a few Maasai tribe men at our hotel at Ngorogoro before dinner doing a performance and they did nothing but jump a whole lot. They seriously jump very very high!



This is their market where they make items and then sell them to tourists. This is where I bought Anderson and Lydia's gifts. Lydia got a bracelet made by Maasai women and Anderson got a necklace of a lion's tooth. They both loved their gifts. Justin was also obsessed with the lion's tooth necklace, so he bought one for him too.

Once we got to the village, we were greeted by the chief's son. The rest of the tribe came out to greet us as well and did a dance for us. Here are some pictures of the village and the video I took of the dance they did.









Once we went inside the "walls" of their village, they did another dance for us and then we split up into groups of two and we each had our own villager to give us a tour of their village. I can't remember me and Justin's guides name, but he was 25 and unmarried. He took us into his house and let me take pictures. Their homes are made from hay and dried up animal feces. He explained to us how they live and how/what they eat. He mentioned to us that there are 24 homes in the particular village that we were visiting. And he told us that his father had 12 wives. Sister Wives anyone?



This is what the outside of their houses looks like.



This is inside his house. That's the bed and in front of the bed is the kitchen. To the right is another bed, but you can't see it in this picture. Justin and I sat on this bed while the guide was explaining Maasai culture to us.

After leaving his house, we went to see the schoolhouse where all the kids were singing. I got a video of that too of course :)



See the kid with the Obama shirt on??? I told y'all they're obsessed with him over there!



This is a picture of the schoolhouse.



These kids learn the Maasai language, but they are also taught English because of the high volume of visitors they get to their village.

After observing the kids at school for a while, we went out into a field where a few of the Maasai men taught some of our men to throw spears. Justin was one of the ones to throw the spear and he actually threw it the best out of all the guys that tried. Our guide kept saying "you win" as if it were a contest. Side note - Justin took the fact that he "won" the spear throwing contest as a sign from God that he should own a spear...so we bought one. Right now it's laying against a wall in our living room but we do plan on hanging it up at some point. I'll probably hang it over wherever I hang the frame that I put our Kilimanjaro certificates in.





One of the other men who bought a spear actually negotiated for it. The man tha twas selling him one really liked his digital watch. He asked if these are popular where we come from and he said yes. He could tell the villager was intrigued by the watch so he offered him the watch in exchange for the spear. The villager accepted quickly and started showing off his new watch. Once Marcy (the one from Atlanta) saw that he did this, she offered her digital watch for something as well and the villager accepted it at the time, but as she was getting into her safari vehicle to leave, he chased her down and said the watch was no good and asked for her items back. We think that the sudden change of heart was because the watch was a woman's watch and had a little bit of pink in it and he didn't notice it at the time.

And finally, the villagers showed us how they make fire. They use a sword to cut a hole in a piece of wood and rub a stick into the hole in that wood to create the fire. Once the fire is burning, they use dried up animal feces to keep the flame going (surprise surprise).







And the final product...FIRE!



This is a picture of Justin and I before we left the village (excuse the windblown hair...it is surprisingly WINDY on the plains). See his lion's tooth necklace? That's what I gave Anderson, who apparently got into an argument with the clerk at Coldwater Creek about whether or not it was a real lion's tooth. God love him :)

Check back sometime this weekend for our final game drive through the Ngorogoro Crater!

December 30, 2010

So sorry it's taking me so long to get this last bit of safari pictures up, but it's officially my busy season now and I have close to no free time. I must admit, I actually didn't write journal entries past December 29, 2010 because I really just didn't have time. I hate that because they were probably two of my favorite days of the whole trip! So instead, I'll just put up my safari pictures from December 30, 2010 and put a little pit of commentary in them. This is day two of our safari where we traveled from the Serengeti to Ndutu and we stayed at Ndutu Lodge. Enjoy :)



We had several monkeys show up on our balcony at Serengeti Sopa Lodge in the morning before we left on our game drive for the day. We had a dad, mom and baby entertain us for a while. In this picture the mom is breastfeeding the baby. See the video at the bottom of this post.



It was yawning



This poor lioness was missing a foot!! See her front left paw?? You shouldn't...because it's not there! You can tell in the next several pictures of her that she hasn't been able to hunt because you can literally see her ribs and bones. She's probably dead by now. I promise I'm not trying to be mean by saying that, it's just a fact. She can't survive without hunting.







Momma and baby hyenas. These guys are U.G.L.Y. I am not a fan of hyenas. Their laugh is pretty funny, however they are awful animals. Our safari guide told us that when a Hyena kills its prey, it doesn't go immediately for the kill to make eating it easier, it will actually eat it's prey in places that keep it alive so that it suffers before it goes for the final kill. CRAZY!!! Can't remember if I mentioned it in the last post, but we saw a cheetah chase down a wildebeest and kill it, but the leopard never got a chance to enjoy his food because a couple of hyenas came up and stole the wildebeest from the leopard. The guide told us that even the bigger animals steer clear of hyenas.



Warthog...better known to some of us as "Pumba".



Mufasa on the rocks! The artist for The Lion King actually came out to the Serengeti and saw these rock formations everywhere and modeled "Pride Rock" from the movie after all of these rocks.



They looked like this and they were all over the place.



Zebras. These guys were a dime a dozen as were the wildebeest. Zebras and wildebeest migrate together because one of them has a good sense of smell but bad sight and the other has great sight, but not such a great sense of smell (can't remember which one is which). Together they make a good team for traveling and watching out for predators. Usually the zebra will lead the packs and their packs are HUGE. I'm totally not exaggerating when I say that there are MILLIONS of zebra and wildebeest.





Wildebeest, in case you didn't know what that was.



We stumbled onto three baby cheetah's and their mom when we ate lunch for the day.



The mom



Two of the babies



This is when the mom got up because she saw a baby gazelle and we watched her chase down the gazelle, but she never caught up to it. It was still fun to watch the chase. Deep down, I'm glad the gazelle got away though.



This is me eating lunch with the cheetah's in the background. Gives you an idea of how close we were.



The next several pictures of lions and their cubs are some of my favorite pictures I took while in Africa. I did bring a zoom lens that I used for a lot of pictures, but these guys were literally right outside our door. I did attempt to put on the zoom lens, but I saw nothing but their eyeball...they were that close to us. So these pictures were taken with my regular lens.









It was three cubs, three moms, and papa lion was there too, but he just layed under the tree and never really moved. What was funny was that after sitting there watching the lions and cubs for about 30 mintues, we noticed that a pack of zebra and wildebeest were coming up on us, so we moved our car so that the lions could see them. We wanted to see if they would attack.



It was a while before the zebras and wildebeest noticed the lions, but the second they did, they turned around and ran away as fast as they could! In the above picture, those lions are just to the left of all the zebras. Unfortunately, the lions didn't budge. Apparently they weren't hungry.



This elephant was right next to our car. I'm pretty sure it's a mom...who is currently nursing...



The view of Ndutu Lodge, where we stayed our second night of the safari. We got TONS of animal visitors at this lodge because of the watering hole that was to the right of the main lobby.



This is me in front of our house at the Lodge. This was my favorite place that we stayed at on the safari when it comes to seeing animals because they were so close to us, however, it was my least favorite when it comes to comfort. I didn't like the bugs and beetles that swarmed this place. They freaked me out. And yes, I just said that bugs and beetles freaked me out, even though being so close to lions and leopards and cheetah's don't freak me out. I'm fascinated by those animals. I couldn't care less about a dung beetle. You should google that to see a picture of the size beetle we're talking about here. I'm not talking about something the size of your average cockroach!



This is the view from where we all hung out while at the lodge. You can see tons of Zebra in the background!



A family of elephants walking in front of our room to go to the watering hole for a shower.



This is one of my favorite pictures from Ndutu Lodge. This is literally right in front of our little porch on our house at Ndutu. These signs were all over the grounds because of how many animals show up at night and throughout the day. Oh yeah, at all of our safari lodges, we had to be walked to our rooms by a security guard after dinner because it was dark outside and animals could be anywhere. It's hotel policy. We thought that was so awesome!

And here's some of my videos for this day on the safari:



This is a little long of a video, but it was too good not to capture! This is at our room at the Serengeti Sopa Lodge before we left for the game drive to Ndutu. We woke up and started packing and getting ready. Justin had opened the balcony door and started looking out into the fields with his binoculars trying to find animals. I turned around and said "Um...Justin...look down". He looked down and found this guy on our balcony. He then preceded to play with the monkey and tease it, letting it think we would let it into our hotel room. It was a mom and dad and a baby. The baby is ADORABLE! It's a velvet monkey, in case you're wondering. Nickamed "blue balls monkey". I'll let you form your own guesses to why that's a nickname.



This is a video of the cheetah's



A short video of zebras and wildebeest crossing the road



A short video of two Grant Gazelles fighting...playfully.



And here's an awesome video I took from Ndutu Lodge of all the animals going to the watering hole. At this lodge, we were visited by zebra, elephants, buffalo, giraffe, and gazelles...and lots and lots of dung beetles.

Tomorrow (and by tomorrow I mean December 31, 2010, not that I'll actually blog tomorrow because it probably won't happen until the weekend) we leave Ndutu to head for a visit to the Maasai tribe where we learn to make fire, throw spears, and watch their tribal dances. VERY interesting stuff so check back soon!