Serengeti - Move from Kati Kati to Mbuzi Mawe

Slept much better last night, only woke up once! Woke up to a giraffe outside the tent which we saw when we were walking over to the main lodge for breakfast. Our guide eats all our meals with us at this camp, breakfast is one meal that we really like here. There are various fresh fruit, fresh squeezed juice, bacon, sausage, and eggs made however you want them. Mango season has started as well, I can never have too much mango. I have had an egg every day for breakfast, this is why we have asked that they stop putting eggs in our lunch. We are eating much bigger breakfasts than at home, so no need for so much food at lunch. Today we check out and move to another camp further North in the Serengeti. At Kati Kati where we are now before you leave the dining tent after supper they ask you what time you want breakfast at so they can be prepared, and they also ask you what time you want your wake up call. Wake up call here is someone coming by your tent in the morning and calling out “Jambo Jambo”, I am going to miss this. Back to our tent, pack up the jeep, and notice 2 more giraffe, a young one and and older one, I guess this is going to be a giraffe day. 

Giraffe greet us at breakfast this morning, the mound by our jeep is where the lions were the fist night at supper

Giraffe visit at camp

Good bye view as we leave Kati Kati, we had a great time here

Leaving the camp there are lots of wildebeest this morning

Lots of cheetah food, but no cheetah this morning

 

Our first stop this morning  is at 4 hyenas that are crunching on bones. This is the most we have seen together. The hyenas are the clean up crew, after everyone else is finished they come along and eat up all the bones that are left behind. We see hardly any bones around, thanks to the hyena.

Our next stop is at a a spot where we see 2 eagles on a dead tree. I look through the binoculars and we see that one of them seems to be eating something. We drove around to the other side of the tree and have a fantastic view of a Tawny Eagle eating a rabbit. I can't believe the size of the chunks it would eat, we watched it devour everything, Andre got some amazing graphic pictures, yuck.

The next big stop was at a lion kill. We knew something was coming up because we could see a long line of cars up ahead. We waited in the line for about 30 minutes, to see a new large pride of lions that had a successful kill of a Cape Buffalo and were eating this. It was good to see, but I told Felix that next time we would just do a drive by and try to grab a picture, it is definitely not my idea of Africa, spending time in a line up to take pictures. I know it is amazing, but it was just too much, jeeps were not always playing fair, jumping in and out of the line, enough, time to move on. I keep hearing this is low season, I would NOT want to be here in high season, or at least I would not want to be where all the tourists are in high season. 

 

Something big must be happening up ahead, line up in both directions!

Queue to see the lion kill

-1 buffalo

Time for a siesta after the meal

We stopped at a couple of water holes today as well that the wildebeest and zebras were very skittish at. They would all go down to the water, something would spook them, and then panic to get out of the water. This was like our river crossing I guess. Tried to take a couple of videos, I hope they turn out, the dust and panic is amazing.

Everything is nice and calm enjoying a drink of water

One gets spooked we all get spooked

Lets try this again

Who cried wolf this time?

Major panic to the other side of the road!

We also were watching some stork that were just amazing. They have this pouch at their throat area that expands like a balloon when they fly to help them because they are so heavy, when they land this pouch thing deflates like a deflated balloon and you can't even see it. One landed while we were watching, I don't think I have ever seen such a graceful landing of a bird, and these birds are big! One funny thing we learned about the storks, they all had white legs, but they really have black legs, but cover their legs in their own poop to keep from getting sunburned, I think I will stick to the stuff in the tube thanks.

Tawny Eagle is not going to share

Stork coming in for a graceful landing

We also stopped at a few different hippo pools today. There is one pool that has picnic tables and bathrooms, this is where we had lunch. This was also the saddest part of the day, it is so dry here the hippos really seem to be suffering. Hardly any water in the pool, basically just mud. We saw one poor baby that did not make it, legs straight up in the air. The hippos are so squished in such a small area, I hope it rains a lot soon for them. 

How many hippos?

Move over, more coming in!

Crocs in the hippo pool

Yellow billed stork

There were all these worn down paths around the ponds and we asked Felix what made these, turns out it is the hippo travel up to 20 KM to find food at night, follow along in a straight line, leave poop so they can find their way back to the pond later. These are really beaten down paths, I thought they may be walking paths, but who would be walking out here?

Hippo walking path

Another hippo walking path, you can even see the center line!

Today we travelled quite a bit west, then North to our new campsite. We saw all of the animals again except for the cheetah and leopard which Felix says are only in the central part right now. We don't see nearly the same quantity of animals when we see them, but we still have seen everything, and much fewer people. Lots more mountains around, great to see the different landscapes. 

 

Brown snake eagle

 Eastern Pale Chanting Gooshawk

Lappet-faced Vulture

I loved watching the warthogs, never get tired of watching them run and stop on a dime to check us out, then take off again tails in the air!

Topi running away from us

Mother and very young baby, part of the umbilical cord is still on the baby

Young zebra

Young Topi

We also saw some wildebeest with zebra having the same issues as the zebra earlier, so thirsty, but so afraid of what might get them around the watering holes, this gave us a little sense of what the river crossing must be like earlier in the year, I guess this is our river crossing

Lots of beautiful scenery in this part of the Serengeti

We are now in our new camp, Mbuzi Mawe Tented Camp.  This is definitely a step up and the nicest place we have been yet. It is a permanent tented camp, so pretty much like a hotel except you are in a tent. We have 2 double beds, a dresser, a huge changing area, all tile floors, 2 sinks, separate toilet and shower area. Power is on at all times, and you can charge all electronics in your room, which is a nice change. Even a phone in our room.

I will not walk beyond this point

Our new tent at Mbuzi Mawe, a slight upgrade from Kati Kati

I wish I had a double vanity at home!  Even a hair dryer here!

There is a bar here, so we took advantage of a beer and gin and tonic when we arrived and took these back to sit on our little porch outside our tent. Outside the tent we have seen monkeys, hyrax, Klipsspringer (a really tiny antelope), guinea fowl, and signs that elephants have been by. We also saw a giraffe right at the entrance to the camp, a good sign to end the day since we started with giraffe.

Sitting on our porch

Klipspringer by our tent, this is full size!

We might hear noises tonight, this tree hyrax is on our tent roof, and they are everywhere in the trees here.

Our first rain storm happened while we were out on the porch. It poured for around 30 minutes, I hope it is enough to green things up, and for those poor hippos. Lots of thunder, but we didn't see any lightning. One thing I did not like about this camp is they were watering the grass at the entrance when we arrived by a sprinkler, really?  Do they need to try to grow green grass here when it is so dry?

Rain clouds moving in, it is badly needed

 

Just got off Skype with Joey, so now I've been able to speak to Jill and Joey from Africa. Good to let them know that we are doing great, we haven't had Internet for a few days so it is good to be in touch again. Off to dinner now, we'll see how it compares to the last few places. This camp by far has the best internet of anywhere we have been, really very close to home speed.

Back from dinner, the fanciest we have seen yet for sure. They start off bringing you warm cloths to wash up, then a 5 course meal. They set up tables with who you are booked with, there were a couple of large tables that must have been tour groups, and a couple of tables for 2 as well. I think the camp must have been full as the dining room was pretty full. At one of the large tables it appeared to be some sort of family reunion, there was a couple of children around 4 and 6, I can't imagine trying to keep them happy 8-10 hours a day in a jeep. Maybe they did much shorter drives, but this camp doesn't have a pool either and it's not like you can let them run around outside, so it would be tough on a kid I would think, but what an experience! Dinner was delicious, we again had the trainee waitress, she was being shadowed by the trainer, she first asked me if I wanted bread, I said yes please, and then she took the basket over to Andre, oops poor girl didn't take long to be corrected by her trainer.

Tonights dessert, yep we are camping :)

When it is dark out you are escorted by someone with the always comforting flashlight back to your tent. Tonight we had to wait a few minutes for someone to escort us after dinner and we were looking through the guest book in the lobby and Andre says there had been someone from Riverview, NB here, and someone from Shediac too. Turns out it is Linda and Tracey from home, we never did check itineraries to see if we would cross paths, well they were at this same camp 2 days before us. Not sure if we would have crossed paths on the road, they may have flown out from here also, I'm not sure how far into their travels they were.

Back to our room to discover they have turned down the bed and totally closed up all of the tent, all the windows are covered. After the first night where I wanted everything closed I have gotten over that and since then have slept with everything open. It has been beautiful waking up with the sun, hearing the songbirds first thing in the morning, and of course the night noises. We'll see how it goes tonight, I bet tomorrow night for our last night some windows will be open!

An early night again tonight, though Felix is letting sleep in a little tomorrow, game drive only starts at 7:30.