Serengeti National Park 26 – 30 August 2011

Serengeti NP 26-30 August 2011 Every time we come from the Serengeti, we say that it couldn’t get any better… And again on this trip it was no exception. Even though the migration is around Kenya right now, we still saw fabulous wildlife and some great action by the predators. And to think it was touch and go to actually get there… 2 days before we were schedule to leave, Dru contracted malaria. Luckily we caught it in the early stages and he started taking the medication immediately. Even so, the doctor wouldn’t clear him to travel until the morning we were due to fly to Arusha, and then with strict instructions not to drink for the entire trip ;) Dru had to tough it out for the 1st day or 2 with the after effects of the malaria, but recovered enough to thoroughly enjoy the trip. We did the same thing as last time – flew to Arusha and hired a safari vehicle with guide and cook. Ali our guide was fantastic – patient, knowledgeable, on time, enthusiastic and prepared to drive around for hours. Chris, our cook, kept us well nourished throughout the trip, and most importantly – made sure we had coffee at 5.30 every morning ;) So altogether 4 nights, 5 days in the Serengeti – sighting 68 lions, 4 leopards, 12 cheetahs, dozens of elephants and buffaloes, tons of gazelles, 2 new bird identifications, a combined total of 2647 photos, and about 30min of video – we were very happy with our trip. I’ll be posting more photos of our trip on Flickr – check it out here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/63696000@N00/ We’ve also started a blog and are currently loading all our trips, from both Tanzania and Botswana on it – check it out on: http://anthilltiger.blogspot.com/ Enjoy the photos! Dru & Cheryl

After a good night’s sleep for me, and a bad one for Dru thanks to him still recovering from malaria, we met up with Ali and Chris at 6am before leaving Moshi for the 8 hour trip to the Serengeti gate. The drive is a tough one – a 4 hour drive on tar until we get to the Ngorongoro Crater gate. From there it’s all tough gravel driving and was made worse this time by the thick mist that hung over the crater rim. We could hardly see 2 feet in front of us, how Ali managed to drive through it is beyond me! This time round there was so much mist and fog that we couldn’t see the crater floor from the view point. Luckily, once we have passed the crater, it cleared up and the sun came out although it was still pretty cold. Finally after a rough, bumpy road (is it possible that it was worse than last time?) we finally got to the Naabi Hill gate at around 2pm. There was a surprisingly long queue of cars, so we took the opportunity to have our packed lunch while Ali sorted out the booking.

Buffalo herd

Tawny eagle Martial eagle

It took us about 45 minutes before we were all sorted at the gate, and ready to head into the Serengeti plains. We got all the way to Simba Kopjes, about 20km inside the park, but instead of just driving through, we turned off and explored the marsh around Simba Kopjes, which we hadn’t known existed. Turned out to be a good choice – 8 lions relaxing at the marsh! Unfortunately too hidden in the grass for any good photos, but we spent quite a bit of time with them and the nearby buffalo herd before heading back to the main road. We had almost got to the central Seronera pool, when we came across a bunch of cars, and our first cheetah for the trip. He wasn’t doing too much, but nice to have a spotted cat sighting under our belt first up ;) We didn’t see much more except a sleeping lion and headed to camp soon after while it was still light to set up camp and so that Chris could get dinner sorted out. The camp was CROWDED, about 50 tents set up in the area. So a busy night ahead… and making it worse only 2 showers and 3 (squatting only) toilets for all the people… not the ideal camping scenario!

Lappet-faced vulture (L) & White-backed vulture (R)

Hippo in the water

Black crake

Cheetah

It was an eventful first night at camp. Hyenas were running around the campsite, doing their whooping call, while lions were roaring close by. Poor Dru, still struggling with the recovery of malaria, hardly slept at all and was able to tell me in the morning that the lions had killed in the night and had attracted the hyenas coming to grab the kill. I slept through all of it ;) We were up at 5.30 am for our cup of coffee and biscuits, before the packed breakfasts and lunches were loaded into the car, and we were off at about 6.15am. About 50m from the campsite, Dru was proved right and we spotted 2 hyenas with the remnants of a wildebeest skull. It was a bit too dark to take photos, so we headed off towards the river to catch some good sightings.

Sunrise in the Serengeti

Bateleur Hyena

Hyena drinking

It was just after 8am when we came across a “clump” of lions… 14 in all, all lying on top of each other right next to the side of the road – why they chose that hot and unshaded area, I have no idea, but almost all of them were fast asleep, despite the numerous cars watching and taking photos. Eventually they started moving around, especially the younger lions. Finally one of the adult lionesses got up, which signalled move time. Not that it was very far – across the road where they sought the shade of the safari vehicles ;) We spent over an hour with these lions, enjoying the close encounter before heading off to breakfast.

Clump of lions

Looking for shade

There is only one picnic site in the Seronera area, so we headed that way for breakfast. It’s pretty run-down but has a great view up on a little hill (and of course more squatting toilets) so we had our packed breakfast and coffee at the site, kept company by the buffalo weavers and starlings. After breakfast was done, we headed towards the Southern side of the Serengeti, on our way to Moru Kopjes, spotting and photographing a tiny Pygmy Falcon.

Pygmy falcon Zebra calf drinking White-headed buffalo-weaver

Olive baboon Hitching a ride Ground plover Ouch!

We came across a nice scene of buffalo and zebra, with a troupe of Olive Baboons having a breakfast of sausage fruit under a huge sausage tree. Baboons are very entertaining to watch, especially the little ones, and we spent a lot of time watching them, while trying to identify the birds in the tree eating both the flowers from the Sausage tree as well as the hard fruit that it produces.

Buffaloes

Snack time Olive baboon eating the sausage tree fruit

Annoyed elephant

Dru catching an elephant crossing

After enjoying the peaceful scene we headed towards Moru Kopjes, where we found 2 lionesses sleeping under a little bush. We decided to have lunch near them in case they got up, but in end they hardly moved, and we spent more time trying to identify a Coqui Francolin, than watching the lions! We finally headed back to the Seronera river for the afternoon drive, and were lucky enough to spot a leopard in a tree. It wasn’t too far away from the road, although the light was bad for photographing, and eventually we left all the cars watching and headed across the river to see what else was around.

Nap time

Black-backed jackal

Ali found us a great last sighting for the evening – an active hyena den! It’s the first time we’ve seen so many hyenas together, and so many different generations of hyena together at once. We counted 5 generations in all – mothers, nephews and nieces that help look after the cubs, and then 3 different ages of cubs. There were probably about 20 in total, all running around playing and very entertaining to watch – a lovely hour spent watching them and a lovely way to end a great day in the Serengeti!

Hyenas at the den

After a quiet night at a much less crowded campsite, it was up early again and we were first out of camp while it was still dark. We headed up the road to Mwanza, before turning towards the river, spotting a couple of hippos still grazing out on land before heading back to the river. But as we headed round a bend, we spotted a great sight – 22 lions! There must have been about 4 lionesses, and the rest were sub-adult lions and cubs. What was more interesting, besides them playing around on a dead tree – there were 5 or 6 buffaloes right there as well, and the sub-adults were attempting to intimidate them by “stalking” them. They weren’t particularly effective, and if the youngsters got too close, the buffaloes would charge at them, sending the lions skeltering in all directions! It was a pity it was still too dark to get any good photos, but great to be first on the scene to see all that – by the time other cars arrived, the lions and buffalo had lost interest in each other and had headed off down the road. They didn’t go far though – the lions discovered an elephant in a ravine, happily grazing. For a moment, even the lionesses seemed interested, some of them even trying to head down the bank for a closer look, but the elephant took no notice of all these eyes watching, and eventually the lions headed off into the veld out of sight – but a fabulous encounter first thing in the morning!

Lions vs Buffalo

Lions vs Elephant

Still excited about our lion encounter, we headed down the river but didn’t see too much of interest until we got to the little pond at the centre of Seronera. And there heading in our direction was a lone cheetah! Awesome! He walked towards us from the other side of the road before heading to a little stream of water for a drink. He was pretty nervy, looking in every direction before finally settling down to take a long drink, stopping every now and then to look around for any potential predators. Eventually done, he headed back towards our car before heading across the road, stopping only to mark a tree before heading into the Serengeti plains – it’s pretty special to see a cheetah on the open veld! Happy with this sighting, we headed to Masai Kopjes (named so because it was where the Masai settled when they lived in the Serengeti) to see what else the park held…

Cheetah coming to drink

We didn’t have to wait long before our next sighting – mating lions! And our timing was pretty good – they mate every 20 minutes or so, and we arrived just in time for the next session ;) We’ve seen quite a few mating lions, and we unanimously agreed, this was the most unenthusiastic display we’d seen. Normally it’s an aggressive session, but these 2 seemed to be just going through the motions for the human spectators ;) We stayed with them for about 30 minutes, before heading towards a small kopje for breakfast, spotting another 2 cheetahs on the way – unfortunately too far away to shoot.

Mating lions

After breakfast, we headed towards the Eastern plains of the Serengeti. This is the true image of the Serengeti plains – just open veld wherever you look and in all directions – it’s pretty spectacular. And you’re very aware that if you got lost (and that’s quite easy to do!) it would be a while before anyone found you! After not seeing much except some Coke’s Hartebeest and gazelles, we spotted a couple of lionesses on a mission, moving camouflaged in the long grass before standing on anthills to scan the horizon. One of the lionesses eventually walked down the track with us following her. She and the other lioness eventually headed into the veld and we left them and continued until we found a lone elephant drinking at the marsh of the Seronera River.

Queen of the road

We headed back to the other side of the river for the afternoon drive. One of the more unusual sightings was a tiny Thompson’s gazelle fawn – it couldn’t have been more than a few hours old and we had only spotted it because it was on the road with its mother – once it lay down in the ground it was almost invisible. An amazing spot by Dru found us a leopard in a tree – not even Ali or the other guides that were driving past spotted this spotted cat wedged in the branch. It was clear he wasn’t coming down any time soon, so we carried on driving, an area that we hadn’t been to so far in the trip, and it seemed pretty quiet, making me wonder why we were actually spending time there… I was wrong… Not long after, we spotted a cheetah pretty far away. Not only one, but soon we spotted her with 2 sub-adult cubs. And they seemed on a mission – switching constantly between running and stopping to look around… on the hunt we found out…

Difference in size and colour between Thompson’s gazelle (L) and Grant’s gazelle (R)

Well camouflaged Gazelle fawns are odourless and blend in really well in the grass

I couldn’t spot the leopard – can you?

Coke’s hartebeest

After some predicting where she was going, we parked the car and were soon rewarded with her and her cubs finally heading towards the road, before crossing it and stopping at a mound on the side of the road, giving us some close up sightings. But she didn’t stop there – soon heading into the veld with her eyes on a few Thompson gazelles about 100m in the distance. From there, she went into stalk mode and her cubs seemed to know what to do – forming a line behind her so as not to break cover. The Tommys seemed to know she was there but the grass was too tall to see clearly. Suddenly, about 40m away from the gazelle, she took off running. We thought she was too far away to be successful, but the amazing acceleration of the cheetah is something to behold first hand. She moved so fast that the gazelle didn’t have a chance, and within seconds it was over – a successful kill! The cubs were soon bounding after her, to get their share. Unfortunately the hunt itself was too far away and the photos were just blobs in the grass, but fantastic to witness!

Cheetahs on the hunt

After the excitement of the successful hunt, we headed back to the river, but it was a quiet evening. Ali seemed keen to head back to camp, but since there was still over an hour of light left, we headed through the woodland at the special campsites, and back to the hyena den for some more entertainment with the cubs. They were even more entertaining this time – one of them had a leftover bone and was running around with the others chasing him. The cubs are really rough – even at that young age – tough lessons that set them up for fighting with lions in the future! It was heading to dark before we left them and got back to another pretty uncrowded campsite for the evening. Again up early in the morning, but the morning drive was unsuccessful, hardly seeing anything around. Ali needed to put petrol in the car, so he dropped us off at the visitor’s centre to have breakfast. We were still photographing the birds and rock hyraxes by the time he got back, entertained by the boldness of the hyraxes looking for scraps.

Grey-backed cameroptera

Green-winged pytilia Lappet-faced vulture

Rock hyrax looking for scraps Car guards ;)

Red-billed oxpecker on giraffe

After breakfast we left the centre but stopped almost immediately when we found a band of banded mongoose. They’re great to watch when they start to run, it’s like a wave of rodents squeaking when they’re alarmed, the cause of which in this case was a Dark Chanting Goshawk. We decided to head to the Masai Kopjes again, and were rewarded again on the turnoff with the sighting of a leopard – again in a tree. Just too far away to photograph, but our 3rd leopard in a tree – not too bad… After driving for a while and seeing a male lion sleeping in the tall grass, we spotted another cheetah and her 2 cubs. This was too far for good photographs – we’d been spoilt with the photo opportunities the day before! What followed was a very interesting, but unproductive drive through a stack of kopjes – perfect for leopard, but none to be found! Finally back at Masai Kopjes we found the mating male lion from 2 days previously resting on a rock, obviously done with his duties for the next few months!

Band of banded mongoose

Banded mongoose

Black-winged stilt White-backed vulture

Back to the other side of the river, and we drove for quite a while, but it was very quiet on the predator front. We eventually found a couple of lions who appeared to be keen to hunt, especially since there were a few dozen gazelles close by. And after a bit of stalking and hiding in the grass they spooked the gazelle who started to run. Unfortunately, it seemed the lionesses were frozen with all this flurry of running and the hunt was over before it began! We waited for a while over lunch, but in the end we left them for a while and went to search for more. We found a nice herd of elephants on the veld and spent some time with them, but eventually returned to the lionesses to see if they were trying to hunt again…

White-browed coucal Young elephants play-fighting

Hyena sleeping like a dog

Lion scanning the horizon

Giraffes on the horizon

Kori bustard

Common reedbuck Kirk’s dik-dik

Rock hyrax Warthog

And so they were… The one lioness was almost in the same spot that we’d left her, but her sister was further down watching the gazelles, which seemed very uneasy. We left the lioness that was close to the road, and headed toward the other one, who seemed in stalk mode – right down in the grass that we could hardly distinguish her. The gazelles knew there was a threat and surprised us when they actually started to mob her – about a dozen were so close to her that she could had reached out and touched one! She eventually took off and scattered the herd, we were surprised looking at the photos afterwards that she actually ran right past one! But she obviously had her eye on one and targeted it – unfortunately for her, he was up to the challenge and escaped! Meanwhile the scattering in the herd took a number of them right past her sister – who hardly moved in the whole time! I think if she had just stuck a paw out she would have tripped one ;) but in the end the gazelles all survived another day, and the lionesses went hungry! I can now see why they have such a low success rate ;)

The hunt is on So close… yet so far

After that bit of excitement, we found another leopard – for the first time not in a tree ;) But so far away and mostly hidden by scrub, that we needed binoculars to see it. We waited quite a while in the hope that she would get up and head our way, but it wasn’t to be, so after about an hour we left and spent the rest of the evening drive with a nice herd of elephants grazing in the setting sun before heading to the campsite. We had one last highlight before we got to camp – just outside the campsite we spotted a side-striped jackal – a most unusual sighting for us. We’ve only seen 2 of these jackals before, as opposed to the common black-backed jackal – and this was our first in Tanzania. He was very relaxed, and even though it was quite dark, he posed long enough for us to get a couple of shots, before headed into camp for dinner and an early evening, since we were leaving the next day.

Agama

Grazing Tommys

Rock pigeons on a rock

We were up at the usual time of 5.30am for coffee, but we had to pack up for the drive out. After checking for hyenas (there had been at least one hanging around one of the tents the night before) we packed up and both us, Ali and Chris were all ready to go by 6.30 – quite impressive since hardly anyone else had left for the morning drive yet. We had decided to head out for one last drive before leaving the park. Unfortunately, there didn’t seem to be any cats that wanted to say goodbye :( So after a fruitless drive along the river, we headed further down to check for leopards in trees ;) Even they were scarce though…

Side-striped jackal

Eagle with kill

Eventually, after doing a round along the river, we headed towards the main road towards the Naabi Hill gate. Reaching the main gravel road, we dropped the roof of the safari vehicle – after all, it wasn’t like we were going to see more than gazelle on the way out… how wrong we were… Not 200m from when we’d turned onto the main road, Ali suddenly stopped the car, turned round to us and smiled, saying “I’m going to show you something special”… He reversed about 50m and there, under a scrubby bush, were 2 lionesses feeding on a fresh kill with 3 lion cubs! Unbelievable! And we’d almost missed it… They were obscured by the branches for the most part, but one of the cubs came out and we spent quite a bit of time with them just watching – with even Ali and Chris getting a couple of photos in! An awesome bonus to end our trip to the Serengeti!

Common ostrich

Lion cub eating

Lion cubs

We finally left the lions and headed to the Naabi Hill gate. We had breakfast there while Ali sorted out the paperwork, and before long were heading back on the long journey to Moshi. Another fabulous trip to one of the most iconic national parks in the world. We finally arrived back in Moshi in the evening, before spending the night and flying out to Dar the following day. Again Serengeti delivered, and we can’t wait for the next visit – hopefully soon!!!!

Marabou storks

Hilderbrand’s starling

In the Serengeti

Animals on the trip Birds sighted on the trip

Lion Little bee-eater Fisher’s lovebird Martial eagle

Leopard Gabar goshawk Superb starling Wattled starling

Cheetah Double-banded courser Hildebrand’s starling Long-tailed (magpie) shrike

Elephant Kori bustard Red-billed buffalo weaver Fork-tailed drongo

Topi Secretary bird White-headed buffalo weaver Yellow-throated sandgrouse

Hartebeest Marabou stork Lesser grey shrike Dark winged chanting goshawk

Thompson’s gazelle African fish eagle White-crowned shrike Green-winged pytilia

Grant’s gazelle Saddle-billed stork Black-winged stilt Grey-backed camoroptera

Buffalo Yellow-billed kite Black crake Pygmy falcon

Zebra African spoonbill Egyptian goose Black-headed heron

Olive baboon Sacred ibis Arrow-marked babbler Black-shouldered kite

Vervet monkey * Coqui francolin White-browed coucal Common ostrich

Warthog Yellow-throated francolin Yellow-billed oxpecker Rock pigeon

Eland Blacksmith lapwing Red-billed oxpecker Three-banded plover

Waterbuck Crowned plover * Silverbird Lilac-breasted roller

Bushbuck Lappet-faced vulture Helmeted guineafowl Bateleur

Common reedbuck White-backed vulture Bare-faced go-away bird Tawny eagle

Black-backed jackal White-headed vulture Southern ground hornbill Scarlet-chested sunbird

Giraffe Griffon vulture African Hoopoe Marico sunbird

Dwarf mongoose Brown-headed parrot

Banded mongoose

Wildebeest * First time sighting

Rock hyrax

Bat-eared fox

Us in the Serengeti