Saturday September 20, 2003
We woke up at 5 am this morning to the sound of the call to prayer. We woke up again at 8, showered, and had breakfast on site at the hotel restaurant. We met Ndashy in the hotel lobby at 9 am to go over the details of our trip, and to pay the balance; it was a relief to hand over the substantial amount of cash we had been carrying.
Finally, we departed with Gudluk, our guide, for Arusha National Park.
The park is about a 45 minute drive outside of Arusha. The first part of the drive is on a tar road, but the last stretch into the park was the worst road I have ever seen, strewn with large rocks. The gravel roads inside the park were a real improvement.
As soon as we entered the park, Gudluk popped the roof hatch on the vehicle, and we spent the next several hours standing as we drove around.
Just a couple of minutes into the park, we saw our first animals: a couple of warthogs running across the road. And after that, the animals were non-stop. The first part of our game drive took us to the Little Serengeti. This plain was covered with zebras, giraffes, cape buffalo, and warthogs.
Next, we went to the Ngurdoto Crater, also known as “Little Ngorogoro”. Though much smaller than Ngorongoro, it looked much the same as I imagine its namesake will look. Its floor was dotted with herds of cape buffalo and giraffes.
Across the crater, we could make out Mount Kilimanjaro just a little; unfortunately it was shrouded in clouds.
We stopped at a lookout point for a lunch picnic. Our boxed lunches were huge: a piece of fried chicken, a samosa, an empanada, a doughnut, a bottle of orange drink, and an apple. I only finished about half of it before I was full.
After lunch, we drove on to the Momella Lakes, which are alkaline and full of flamingoes.
For the last part of our day, we went to Mount Meru, and hiked a pathway up as acclimatization for tomorrow’s start on the Mount Kilimanjaro trek.
An armed guard named Moses escorted us, and kept watch for any stray wildlife along the way.
Arusha National Park is not home to any lions, hippos, cheetahs, or elephants, so we still have lots to see, although we saw so many animals today that it almost seems like we have already done it all! We drove back to our hotel late in the afternoon and went down to the pool for a bit before dinner. Since we have half board at the hotel, we ate at their on site restaurant for dinner. We chose from the fixed menu, and had samosas, salad, coconut chicken and bananas with chocolate sauce for dinner, all at a fancy restaurant that would have cost $9 US each if we had paid for it out of pocket.
After dinner, we browsed in a couple of souvenir shops. It gets dark around 6 pm and this area does not look great for walking after dark, so we haven’t explored too much of Arusha. Tonight we are packing up for our Kilimanjaro trek.
Today’s wildlife sightings:
- Giraffes
- Cape Buffalo
- Zebras
- Warthogs
- Bush bucks
- Water bucks
- Dik diks
- Colobus monkeys
- Blue monkeys
- Baboons
- Flamingoes
- Hornbills
Cook Family Travels 