Day 182: The Serengeti

Going on a safari is kinda like going on a road trip. Fortunately today’s road trip was to the Serengeti. I didn’t realize how exciting this was until we were standing outside of a giant gate welcoming us into the park. The Serengeti is just one of those places, much like Angkor Wat and the Taj Mahal and the Old City in Jerusalem where I never really pictured myself standing in front of. This Round-the-World adventure can be a bit of a head-trip at times.

En route to The Serengeti, we had to drive around Ngorongoro Crater, we stopped to take in the view, and then I continued to love the scenery in between the crater and the Serengeti. Masai homes dotted the landscape. Warriors stood out against the landscape. It was quite beautiful, especially when one would be out with their cattle or lounging in the grass with their friends. I’m in love with the Masai shukas (the colorful shawls they wear around their shoulders) especially against the backdrop of greens and browns in the fields.

Day 182 also happened to be Andrew and my six month trip-aversary! We’ve made it a whole six months of traveling around the world together! Before we left, we wondered how long we would make it… We would not only wonder if our friends were placing bets on whether or not we would make it, and for how long, but we would also make the same kinds of bets ourselves. It seems like forever since we left Korea, yet unbelievable we’ve been on the road for as long as we have been. I’m glad we’re still kicking and this was a wonderful way to celebrate!

Other safari-goers were posing in front of the gate and we readily climbed out of the jeep to take a few pictures of our own. Only, we had to wait for a group of French girls to finish their shots that were no doubt going into their modeling portfolios back home. Leanne and I giggled at their perfectly planned poses and agreed we had to do a similar shoot of our own. The boys played along. Not exactly by choice…

The ride itself was at times, slightly traumatizing. Headache inducing. Cloudy with dust. Bumpy. A small price to pay for the animals on either side of the road. Wildebeest were everywhere. A pregnant hyena gave pause only a few feet from where we stopped. We were mesmerized and we knew we were just getting started.

We stopped for lunch at the bottom of a rocky hill and climbed up the hill for the view after we sifted through our packed lunches for what we each deemed edible. Arnold, our guide, told us that the Serengeti means “endless” and with a view like this, you can see why the park is named so… I was equally impressed with the cloud shadows over the plains.

After we dropped off our tents and bags at the campsite to make more room in the jeep for our afternoon drive, we spotted several jeeps stopped in the middle of the road. We joined them, and sure enough a lioness was sleeping in the tall grass. Only minutes later, a male lion stood up- surprising us all and climbed on top of the lioness. Lit’rally. (I couldn’t bring myself to photograph the lions doin’ it. Sorry, if that’s your thing, but it felt a little too intrusive and I put my camera down during you know, the business…)

“They have separated themselves from the pride to mate.” Arnold told us, and further explained that a male and female will leave the pride for a week. A whole week, to mate every fifteen minutes. The lioness didn’t seem to pleased about this situation and the mating didn’t last for long before they were laying back in the grass again. We waited to see if they would have another go at it, but eventually got bored, and told Arnold we could go.

We saw more elephants, more lions lounging in the grass, and a couple more hyenas until we spotted another group of jeeps in the distance. Arnold sped up and we were bouncing around the back of the jeep all the way to join them.

Everyone was looking towards the ‘sausage trees’ in the distance. There were leopards in them. Can you see the one in the middle of the tree trunk above? Another is standing on the lower branch/stump on the smaller tree below.

We traded binoculars and directions for where to look and we sat for at least a half hour watching one drag a kill up into the tree and a couple of others go from one tree to the next. Leopards. In trees. Andrew was satisfied. He’s been wanting to see a cat in a tree since Uganda like I wanted to see a zebra.

By dusk, we were back at the campsite setting up our tents and standing in line for showers before the sun went down completely. Dinner was again a fun exchange of stories until we realized we should probably head to our tents like everyone else. Only, we stood outside of our tents for awhile longer giggling like schoolchildren over stories and the appropriate accents to go with them. Stopping only to catch our breath from laughing so hard and repeated glances up at the absolutely magnificent starry sky above. Best. Sky. Ever. Hands down. Of not only this trip, but of life. The Serengeti is where it’s at!

Day 181: Lake Manyara

We were so relieved that another couple decided to go on safari with us that the possibility of them not being cool was an afterthought.

“What if they suck?” I asked Andrew over tea and toast for breakfast at the hostel.

“Well, then we’ll have someone new to make fun of after the trip is over…” He responded. Or maybe that’s how I responded in my head. I can’t be entirely sure…

Fortunately, they didn’t suck. At all. As we drove out to Lake Manyara (our first stop on our Tanzanian safari), we discovered that they, too, were Americans, on a longer than average trip around the world, and were equally amused at how strange it sometimes is to talk about traveling around the world to someone who is on a two, maybe three week vacation from home. Questions started flying back and forth and the two hour drive out to the lake flew by.

We were so relieved that another couple decided to go on safari with us that the possibility of them not being cool was an afterthought.

“What if they suck?” I asked Andrew over tea and toast for breakfast at the hostel.

“Well, then we’ll have someone new to make fun of after the trip is over…” He responded. Or maybe that’s how I responded in my head. I can’t be entirely sure…

Fortunately, they didn’t suck. At all. As we drove out to Lake Manyara (our first stop on our Tanzanian safari), we discovered that they, too, were Americans, on a longer than average trip around the world, and were equally amused at how strange it sometimes is to talk about traveling around the world to someone who is on a two, maybe three week vacation from home. Questions started flying back and forth and the two hour drive out to the lake flew by.

Not long into our drive, we spotted them. And then one wasn’t afraid standing so close to the road, I could not stop marveling at how beautiful they were. I know, zebra print isn’t a new thing… But on a real zebra it’s simply fascinating. Against the golden and green grasses, they stood out in such a bold way that it was difficult to say “Ok, we can go…” to our patient driver/tour guide, Arnold.

I knew we had more to see, so I tried not to mourn the zebras as we rolled away and soon became equally elated over the many baboons. So many that we had to wait for them to cross the road before we could continue on our drive. And then… “Stop! Elephant!” I yelled, as a huge elephant was ambling out of the brush, towards the road, right where we had stopped. For a minute I wondered if he was going to come up to our jeep. He slowed down a bit only a couple meters away from us, and then continued on his way, to join the other elephants we had passed on the other side of the road, further away, not nearly as close as this giant beauty got to us.

Breathtaking.

Do you remember that feeling of going to the zoo for the first time? Or maybe even that feeling you might get now, when you’re so close to a wild animal you wonder what would happen if there wasn’t a thick layer of glass or a high fence in between you? That’s kinda what going on a safari is like, only times one hundred. We were all transformed, overtaken with childlike excitement over the elephant after the baboons after the zebras…

There were flamingos in the distance, so many that it created a distinct pink line on the horizon, and then a rainbow on the drive home. Which I took as a reassuring sign that going (way) over budget to do this safari was worth it…

A fairly common (and surprising in my opinion) response to how long we’ve been traveling, and how long we plan to travel is “Oh… you must have so many stories!” I never know how to respond to this, and usually end up saying something along the lines of “I suppose… maybe we do…” often simultaneous to wondering if that’s my cue to tell a story right away.

This actually happened in Jerusalem with our couchsurfer host. He outright demanded a story and I responded with an awkward tale that was neither interesting nor funny because I felt so put on the spot to entertain. Andrew and I relate this reaction to our travels to when people at home (friends, family, random people you run into after a few years) react to us when we say we’ve been living in South Korea for several years. “What’s that like?” They ask nine times out of ten. Then, they expect you to sum it up in one sentence without boring them about the nuances and intricacies of living in a foreign country, let alone, when it’s South Korea. For the record: Yes, I like kimchi and No, I wasn’t afraid of North Korea.

With Josh and Leanne, celebrating their year trip-aversary today, there was no awkward response of what it’s like to travel around the world, or one sentence summary of stories from our trip. We laughed about ridiculous fights we found ourselves getting into, annoying travelers we’ve met along the way, and exchanged stories of tuk-tuk drivers who tried to rip us off in India.

We stayed up too late chatting oblivious to what time we had to get up in the morning until we noticed we were the last table in the dining area. Only then, did we say sneak off for a few hours of sleep before heading to the Serengeti in the morning!

Day 75: Elephants Everywhere!

I was really excited to bathe an elephant. Seriously, who wouldn't be? Especially because the elephant conservation program we were thinking of doing in Thailand was fully booked (and the other was less hands on than I was looking for, and too expensive). I envisioned getting in the water, soap and sponge in hand, and having an elephant all to myself while I scrubbed and loved on him or her. Instead, the mahouts guided their elephant to the river bank, helped tourists on the back, walked the elephant out into the river for five minutes (at most) of the elephant spraying its guest with water. It wasn't what I wanted. I didn't want to get on an elephant's back (It's quite bad for them; you can read more about it here) and I didn't want to reward the mahouts with money for pimping out their elephants. 

Instead, I bought bananas (from a woman who probably used similar punishing methods to train a monkey to climb the tree to retrieve them, as Andrew pointed out) and fed one of the elephants. He was a 34 years old, and his eyes looked so tired. Every poster we saw in Chitwan was all about "freeing the Rhinos" but what about the elephants? I want to free the elephants!

After "bathing" elephants and lunch, Andrew and I attempted to bike to the lakes outside of Chitwan National Park. We thought this would be a great way to see some animals from afar, and some good scenery without having to spring for the park fee that has tripled this past year. We were wrong. We've come to the conclusion (mostly after Chitwan) that all of our decisions in Nepal have been the wrong ones. Not exactly sure where we were after two hours of biking, and having little Nepalese boys make improper gestures at us, we gave up.

We biked back to the center and then made our way to the elephant breeding center. Lonely Planet described this journey as  "an easy walk or cycle along the road past Jungle Lagoon Safari Lodge." Lonely Planet can suck it. If we would have walked, we would not have made it to the breeding center before sundown. It took us twice as long to get there from our estimates. They also made it seem like it was possible to interact with the baby elephants- which was also misleading. 

The Elephant Breeding Center was like a zoo. A zoo for elephants only. That made you feel terrible for the elephants chained up to a post. They get out in the park in the afternoons, but I don't understand why they can't enclose the area for them instead of putting heavy chains around one of their legs. It was fun to watch them eat treats that the mahouts made for them, but mostly because many of the elephants figured out they needed to unwrap the grass around the sugar, molases, and salt and pour that into their mouths.