Not only were we squeaky clean with ashed hair and clothes in anticipation of the tourists' arrival, we also gave Tank her 10 000km's service and clean which needed needed as much time as we did to wash off all the grime! Having to get wheels aligned and our gas bottle filled (finally after over 2 weeks!), meant that we missed their arrival but met them at the lodge after navigating our way through rush hour Arusha traffic. Our entry into tourist land was sufficiently grand with an authoratitive hoot rattling the big black gates and our slow, clean and sparkly grand entrance into the parking area, complete with a small pause before getting out to ensure maximum effect on the group of impressed faces. Arrogance aside, we were like little kids seeing the familiar faces of Jon and Ingrid, especially when they come baring luxury items such as magazines and chocolates! After exchanging some much needed lengthy hugs, we got comfortable in tourist land with the option of a shower or a bath, fluffy clean towels provided, before being served ice cold vodka tonics and beer out of real and clean glasses. Paul and Erika who had organised most of our next 3 weeks went out of their way with a delixioud\s 3-course meal with even better wine around a dining table with real silverware and china while catching up with family., despite our struggling to remember which utensil to use for which course! here was even a TV with comfy couches so we got to watch the SA world cup game in serious comfort as opposed to huddling around the only TV set in town!
Paul was loathe to part with his yellow Land Rover, code named Bumblebee, so he took the whole morning explaining to Jon how everything worked and was supposed to be used, while we took the time to point out the superiority of our Land Cruiser vs the land Rover, much to Paul's dismay. Eventually Jon paid enough attention for Paul to be happy and we were dismissed at around noon. We still had our shopping to do for the next month (the Shoprite being the only shop Shaun and I had seen during our 4 weeks in Tanzania) so we hastily took Jon and Ingrid to our perfectly sussed out fruit and veg vendors before filling up with petrol, collecting our gas bottle and then hitting Shoprite. We managed to fill two trollies full but when the time came to pay, they informed Jon that their VISA machine was not working, despite there being more VISA signs than shopping isles. Thankfully Jon had a wad of trusty dollars so he paid, we threw everything into the two cars and hungrily ate our "meat" pies while driving like the devil to get to our campsite at Lake Manyara National Park before sunset. Jon and Ingrid had decided that they would rather dig their own toilet and shower with lions watching than pay less to use facilities already built, so we were camping in these "special" campsites right the way through, "special" meaning that you were given a dot on the map in the middle of nowhere on which to camp, marked out only by an old pile of ash.
We managed t
o hit the park just before sunset and broke all kinds of speed limits trying to get to our campsite, ignoring herds of Ellies and cute fluffy blue monkeys. I'm pretty sure we also passed a heap of tree-climbing lions which the park is famous for, but we will never find out . . . Jon had bought some 2-way radios so the blurry trip did have loads of entertainment and I got to say things like "Roger that"and "Over and out" when it was confirmed that we would not be stopping for any animals. Thankfully the campsites were well sign posted so we found the campsite easily, but unfortunately Jon's rental came with a ground tent that took engineers and cranes to erect, so Shaun and I got the fire started and dinner on the go as looking at Jon's slow progress, we were convinced he would still be putting up his lion-proof abode come sunrise! During all of this focus and dedication to getting camp set up, not one of us bothered to look around and check for any man-eating or crushing animals, not even when the camp toilet was being dug and our special toilet seat with hole in the middle was erected with great pride.
Only when we were all eventually relaxing around the campfire, drink in hand, did it dawn on us that we were truly in the wild and at the mercy of the appetite of the animals around us, so the spotlight quickly came out and did a sweep of the surrounding bush on average every 2 minutes, or when a noise was heard, which averaged about every 30 seconds. It was an exhausting first day with the tourists so we were eager to get a good night's sleep, however just as our eyelids began to droop, we were woken up by a panicked "Shaun, what was that?!" from the groundlings who were convinced tha
t Simba and his brothers were about to eat them. This continued for most of the night, with Shaun having to stick his head out of our tent and scan the bushes every few minutes, but thankfully they aren't my family yet, so I put my earplugs in and had a marvelous night's sleep, knowing that we would only be second course on any man-eating animal's menu! Needless to say, lion--proof bonfires were lit with much enthusiasm by Jon each night subsequently.We stayed at Lake Manyara for 2 nights all overstepping some serious bound
aries with the toilet being within earshot of the camp and the cold shower within spotlight distance. Not even the symphonic version of the Titanic song that came with Jon's car and which became our toilet visiting theme song could drown out all of the noise. It as all a great laugh though and really special for Shaun and I to have some company, even though it seemed an exchange for sleep. We even had a drop in visit from some special people from Seychelles who were in the area, so had a great, but far too short catch-up with them in the middle of nowhere!
Shaun and Jon were up early the next morning to head back to Arusha to pick up Drew (Shaun's brother) who had arrived from England (and managed to lose our second spare tyre on the way . . .) while Ingrid and I went ahead to Tangire National Park thinking we could relax and catch up on some magazine reading. When we got to the gate however, no one could tell us where our campsite was (which had kindly been pre-booked by Paul and Erika). Another random fellow who happened to overhear our conversation at the gate directed us "passed a bend in the road, through a dry
riverbed and left at the big tree, so we thought we would just follow the signs. Now Ingrid and I are both well travelled and independent but for the life of us, we just couldn't find the campsite, despite following all of the signposts until they just ran out. We even asked for directiosns from anyone we passed (ignoring their obviously sexist expressions at how obvious it was that two woman would get lost), but everyone was so vague in their directions and half the people didn't even know what we were talking about. It started getting late and we were determine to get there before the guys so agreed to head back to the mai
n gate to get a ranger to show us. The park was packed with herds of ellies and in my dash to get to the main gate befoer the guys, I practically drove straight into the kneecaps of an elephant who stopped, stared at us and started coming towards us, clearly annoyed at my intrusion into his stressful life. His ears were flat which is never a good sign so I panicked so much I was nearly in tears, while going over everything Shaun had ever told me to do in the event of an elephant confrontation. So I stood my ground (the car thankfully a lot more steady than I was) and shouted at it, which only got me a quizzical look fro
m the ellie while it continued to proceed towards us. Just as I slipped the car into revers for an all our panicked run, it stopped a meter away from the car, flapped its ears at us and walked off the road and out of my way. Needless to say that my progress towards the gate after that was a lot less hasty. Eventually the ranger showed us down a road where the arrow to the campsite points in the opposite direction so we gave them a earful, they promised that they were in the process of fixing the signs, and we got to the campsite 300 minutes before the guys arrived - the same ranger having received such an earful fro
m us that he gave them directions as well.The two nights we spent here were pretty special with Jon convinced they were being attacked by lion or hyena when Shaun, Drew and I got back to camp late one night after watching a leopard feeding. When we did a reckie of the camp perimeter, we only found a grazing buffalo. At least with the safety of two ground tents now, the panicked midnight calls for the spotlight died down completely and it was only the tree hyrax in the tree under which we had decided to set up camp that did a good job o
f ensuring minimal sleep.Finally the time came to stop fooling around in mini reserves and to hit the big time: Ngorongoro Crater and Serengeti. There was a buzz of excitement as we hit the road that morning, and followed its windy ascent to the rim of the crater. The vegetation was so prehistorically lush that we almost didn't believe it when someone pointed out a magnificent male lion, just chilling in an open patch of grass. The road was dirt track so we got out to put our tyres into 4 wheel drive, and I decided it would be a good
idea to brush my hamstring against a devil nettle from hell. A slight itch steadily grew into a skin numbing burn that rendered me a complete baby and forced me to pull my pants down to my ankles and try and blow on the large welts that were now covering my leg. And so it was with my pants around my ankles that I first laid eyes on the magnificence of the Ngorongoro Crater. No one paid me any attention as they got out of the cars to take in the view while I struggled to get my pants back up. Once I could look it in the eyes, I was met by a drop in the earth 21k
m x 19km around that simply took my breath away - what was left of it anyway.Unable to get into the special campsites that actually had views of the crater, Jon treated us all to two nights at the Ngorongoro Wildlife Lodge with 180 degree views of the crater below. While the porters carried everyone else's bags to their rooms, Shaun and I pretended to be busy with something else, then quickly shoved all of our toiletries and remaining clean clothes in our arms and pockets and ran through to our room. It was pretty cold so we treated ourselves to some much needed hot baths, but proving that you
can take the camper out of the campsite but not the campsite out of the camper, I bathed with all of my dirty clothes floating around me, taking turns to wash myself and my clothing. When I noticed the colour of the bathwater however, some sense came flooding back and I had a shower instead. Drinks on the balcony was a real treat despite wearing all of our warm clothes to fight against the cold, and we son moved inside to feast on the buffet dinner before crashing into the clean and comfy beds.We were up early the next monrin
g to meet our guide and vehicle taking us into the crater. Nature played along as it covered the crater (which is actually a caldera - google it) in the early hours, revealing its beauty slowly as we decended the steep cliffs with the other 100 odd vehicles. The game did nt dissapoint as we saw lion, herds of buffalo and wildebeest and flocks of pink flamingoes feeding on the green algae of the alkaline crater lake. We saw more lion near a massive herd of wildebeest on our way to lunch but they seemed not to be moving so we continued to get some food in our stomachs, only to find upon
our return that they had made a kill as had a pair of cheetah - seems like everyone had to eat. When Jon started snoring in the backseet we realised that it had been a long day and time to go back to our luxurious baths.To ensure that we saw all that the Serengeti had to offer, Paul and Erika had booked us into a special campsite in the central Seronera area for 2 nights, and then in the western Grumeti area for another two nights. Again, when paying our astronomical park and camping fees at the gate, none of the staff could tell us where our campsites were and the ra
nger circled some random spot on the map with no roads leading to it saying "It's here somewhere." To cut a long story short, it took us all afternoon to look for the campsite. There were no signs anywhere and when we got directions it involved "The third kopje" and "Second left" when there were hundreds of kopjes and even more tracks all going left. Eventually we got so gatvol and hungry tat team Tank stopped in the middle of nowhere, got out the cheese and pro-vitas and had a merry old picnic until team Bumblebee pointed out that there was a pack of hyena50m's fro
m us under a tree. The picnic was hastily thrown back and we continued driving in circles until a guide out with his group passed us in the same area for the 5th time and actually took us to the correct track, The campsite we had been given was s0o far away from the action that we decided to put up camp at one of the other ones on a river and right between a herd of ellies and giraffe, again just as the sun was setting. The ellies scattered as soon as the latrine site was chosen and dug, but the inquisitive Giraffe hung around watching us with looks of bewilderment for most of the night. The lion repelling bonfire as the first to go ip after the latrine of course, which coupled with our tight lager formati
on with canvas being erected by Jon in gaps that could let a cat pass and thorn bush filling any other gaps, no animal dared disturb our slumber.There were rumours the next morning of sniffing lions again from the same nervous groundlings but we suspected innocent grazing buffaloes again, while nodding our heads in acknowledgment accompanied by "You're lucky to be alive!" just to make them feel better. Most of our day the next day was spent just driving to get back to where the game was but the endless grasslands really were s
omething to behold. We saw a little more action that night when Shaun decided to swig down our citronella flavoured kerosene mistaking it for water, and spending half of the night trying to wretch it back up, calling for Jon to help him while he as having his own problems on the latrine with a traveler's stomach. Again my earplugs came in handy after telling Shaun to drink whiskey.We tried to sneak in an early morning drive before having to move west but were fined by some seriously anal retentive rangers for going "off the track" when we
were clearly still on one - if only they had seen what we got up to at our campsite! Packing up camp with ground tents and the whole of Shoprite needing to find a home took an average of 2hrs so it was midday again when we headed west to our next campsite, stopping at Seronera info center to get directions. Thankfully this site was actually on the map, so we continued west. The typography immediately changed and became more hilly with herds of hundreds of wildebeest ad zebra filling the grassy plains. The prolonged hours spent in the car inspired us to play the Lion King theme song full blast and behave like a bunch of fairies at a trance party shouting at them to "migrate to the river!" or "follow us to greener pastures!" They simply stared at us, chewing their grass, completely disinterested in greener pastures and the crocodile jaws we wanted to lead them to. The intensity of the fun barometer increased when we turned onto the track leading to our campsite, only to find it completely surrounded by grass taller than our car and the road disappearing into pools of mud. Jon decided to test the group spirit by driving his Land Rover into one of these pools of mud and getting himself thoroughly stuck, so the Land Cruiser had to pull him out: 1-0 to the Land Cruiser! When we eventually got to the campsite (again, just as the sun was setting) the ranger at the nearby post was so surprised to see us, they had to escort us to where the campsite used to be as no one else had ever used it. Thoroughly fed up at having to stay at the ass end of the reserve again while paying all of this money, Jon promptly booked us into Kirawira Luxury tented camp the next day where we stayed in the thick of the action whilst dining on 5 course meals, 3 times a day! Able to save our energy for the game drives now, we continued trying to convince the herds to migrate to the river. When they wouldn't listen, we went and sat on the river bank, watched and waited, and were treated to a croc nearly taking out a wildebeest drinking from the river! Yay!Unfortunately our time with the wildebeest came to an end without us being able to convince them to migrate. Having spent an extra night in Serengeti, we had to make serious haste to get to Uganda on time for our date with the gorillas. It took 3 days of hard traveling through non-tourist Western Tanzania to get there, which gave us the opportunity to show Jon and Ingrid how we had been traveling, taking them to a roadside restaurant for "chips mayai" which didn't go down very well and nearly ended in tears. Nonetheless, not even the bad accommodation in Kigali en-route could dampen our excitement for our date with the gorillas!
