DAY TWO IN THE ANIMAL KINGDOM OF THE MARA

I was up early enough this morning to glimpse two sets of dik-diks grazing around our tents this morning.  I know I say this about alot of animals, but the dik-diks are one of my favourite animals.  A dik-dik is a small antelope and stands stand about 30–40 cm tall and can live for up to 10 years. Dik-diks are named for the alarm calls of the females. In addition to the females' alarm call, both the male and female make a shrill, whistling sound. These calls may alert other animals to predators.  Super cute!!!!

We spent ten hours in the park yesterday and we were going to spend another ten hours today.  It sounds like a lot, but safari hours just seem to slip by, I guess it is just getting lost in the adventure of looking for African animals.  It was really going to be tough to beat what we saw yesterday.  We had again made the decision to stay in the park all day and not return to the lodge for lunch, as they say while in Rome (or Africa) we need to make the most of our time here.  SAFARI DAY TWO….. let’s go!!!

Luckily, because we had our purchased our passes yesterday, we were able to drive straight past the Maasai women this morning with just a friendly nod and a smile.  They can be quite intimidating, and I try and understand that they have families and mouths to feed, they just want the sale badly and this is how I explained it to my two god-daughters. 

                                     

We saw some more giraffes this morning and another baby (or the same one) and I have always been a giraffe lover, but to see a BABY giraffe, OH MY CUTENESS!!!! We sat and observed them for around 30 minutes before we set off in pursuit of more animals.  Shane had asked Pete to really keep an ear out on the walkie talkie today for leopard sightings.  Pete had heard one yesterday, but he said we were way too far away to make the drive, but we were going to head to that section of the park where leopards are known to hang out, and that a lot of the tour vans don’t get too.  Another good reason again that we decided to not head back to the lodge for lunch, so we can get further into the park.  I had a good feeling about seeing a leopard today.  Come kitty kitty.

We came across a lioness, who looked like she was stalking some Zebra, it was amazing to see, the dazzle of zebra unawares, the circle of life happening right in front of us.  Were we going to be that lucky that we would see TWO kills in two days?  The lioness changed direction, what seemed to be still on the stalk towards some impala and hartebeest down the bottom of the valley, but there were no roads down there and we were unable to get any closer as she moved away from us.  We were getting ready to leave when we saw an explosion of animals running, but we couldn’t see why, so maybe she did get some breakfast after all! 

                       

Besides the leopard that was on our list today, we were still also to see a rhino and on my last trip to the Mara, we visited the border of Tanzania, so that was my request today to be able to do that.  Lunch today was spent on the banks of the Mara River.  The Mara River is a river in Mara Region in Tanzania and Narok County in Kenya, and lies across the migration path of the animals in the Serengeti/Maasai Mara game reserves.  The Mara River basin covers a surface of 13,504 km2, of which approximately 60% is located in Kenya and 40% in Tanzania.  From its sources in the Kenyan highlands, the river flows for about 395 km and originates from the Mau Escarpment and drains into Lake Victoria.  We crossed the bridge that spanned the Mara River and found a little shady tree to camp under to eat.  On one side of the bridge was Kenya and on the other side was Tanzania.  We were told that this is the river where you see thousands of wildebeest cross during the migration.  Ahhhhhhhhh.  Another time maybe we will see one of the greatest shows of the animal kingdom, Oh well, we saw the river where it all happens, that will have to do for now.  Pete spread out the blanket for us and with a mirror lunch of yesterday, BBQ chicken, fruit, marble cake, sandwich and fruit box.  There were ALOT of vervet monkeys, who were eyeing off our lunch, but with Pete and the rangers with sling shots in hand, and kept them at bay long enough to not have our lunch stolen by these smart monkeys.  There were some shady toilets at the picnic area, and the girls decided to drop their pants in the bush rather than use them.  It’s funny as Zoe and Tess aren’t used to bush peeing; they have to take off their shoes, so they can take off their shorts, to take off their undies so they could pee.  Needless to say they got bindies in their socks and also in their shorts once they had them back on!!!    There was a sign right near where the girls dropped shorts saying ‘DANGER-do not pass here’.  When we actually left, we could see that we weren’t far from the river and we saw a hippo right there! 

                         

                         

So we started our afternoon game drive with us heading to the Tanzania/Kenya border.  We were seeing plenty of zebra, and right near the ‘border’ we saw a baby zebra with its family.  It was cuteness overload let me tell you.  The ‘border’ is a term used lightly as there is no border control, no border post and no fence.  It will be the only time ever that you will be able to enter Tanzania without a passport actually.  There was a simple stone monument with a K on one side and a T on the other, no security.  I love these quirky border photos, along with the equator/tropic of Capricorn/Antarctic/Arctic and any other imaginary lines across the world.  Not everyone is into that stuff, which is fine but I LOVE it, and so do the Elks.  We got some compulsory jump/family pictures, with one foot in one country and another foot in the other. 

                        

                       

We spent the rest of the afternoon driving in a section that had a lot of trees, where a leopard could be enjoying the afternoon.  There were a lot of dead ends, turn arounds and circling along rarely used tracks in the search for this elusive leopard.  There weren’t a lot of animals in this section of the park, we saw a jackal and a tower of giraffes, which was pretty cool, as I just cannot get over that these magnificent creatures look the way they do, and seem so gentle.  But that was about it, and at 4pm, it was time to start to make our way back to the gate, which was still a few hours away.  We ran into some more elephants on our way out, and I have to say we really didn’t want to leave, even though we had chalked up another ten hours today on the safari list, we could have spent another few hours at least.  But all good things must come to an end, and even though we didn’t see the leopard, and our day was not as exciting as yesterday we still saw bevy of animals and it was another successful day.

                           

                           

We were back to the lodge at 6.30pm and even though we had finished two full days in the Mara, we were advised by Pete that we could do a morning game drive before we head back to Nairobi tomorrow.  This trip was passing way to fast, but what a great time we are having so far and what joy I am getting in seeing my GD’s face as I get to showcase my country to them.