{"id":13927,"date":"2020-05-05T17:27:44","date_gmt":"2020-05-05T15:27:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/siv-sketches.net\/?page_id=13927"},"modified":"2025-02-21T10:51:07","modified_gmt":"2025-02-21T09:51:07","slug":"chapter-39-part-2-serengeti","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/siv-sketches.net\/?page_id=13927","title":{"rendered":"Chapter 42 (Part 2) \u2014 Serengeti"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The entrance to Serengeti. Here we are.<\/p><\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

 We set out from Lake Manyara National Park after two days, leaving the Rift behind us and heading for the Serengeti National Park, passing on the way by the 2-3-million-year-old Ngorongoro crater.<\/p>\r\n

We traveled along Masai villages with busy trade going on in the street. There was just one main street.<\/p>\r\n

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I consider it dubious that prehistoric man might have looked this similar to modern man, but then I don’t think any precise era is specified.<\/p><\/div>\r\n

The big event of that day was Olduvai Gorge, a famous archeological site where there is now a museum. Fossils found here were those of the ancestors of the humans that later spread into the rest of the world. Going through the museum was absolutely fascinating, not to say mind-boggling.<\/p>\r\n

That anthropologists have been able to construct, based on fossils found here, prehistoric humans and conclude that this is the site that humankind originated from — this is almost beyond belief. Homo sapiens<\/em> left this place about 50 – 60,000 years ago, but homo erectus dates from further back. This was indeed one of the high points of our visit to Tanzania.<\/p>\r\n

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The surreal landscape of the Malanja Depression we traveled through after the ‘jungle’ and just before Olduvai Gorge<\/p><\/div>\r\n

Before we drove under the sign to Serengeti National Park, Manny took a picture of John and me with the Ngorongoro crater behind us. We ourselves took several pictures of the astounding views in the crater where we were to spend two wonderful mornings a few days later.<\/p>\r\n

I believe it was in Serengeti that we got to fully appreciate Manny’s eerie ability to sight animals at a great distance. He was a wonderful man and an expert guide.<\/p>\r\n

After passing under the Serengeti sign, four beautiful lions were our welcome committee. They were lying half hidden in the high grass and we were delighted to be greeted like that.<\/p>\r\n

We were also lucky to see, right after crossing the line to the national park, beautiful herds of Grant’s and Thomson’s gazelles, which was a first for us. Grant’s males have beautiful long horns and Thomson’s gazelles have a black stripe on the sides, but less spectacular horns.<\/p>\r\n

Other unforgettable events on the two days in southern Serengeti were a leopard sleeping very comfortably in a tree, legs hanging out over the sides of the branch he was sleeping on. Hilarious. We were to see more of that spectacle<\/em>.<\/p>\r\n

I got le coup de foudre<\/em> for the several topis we saw here, and we were to see many more of those in northern Serengeti. I took one of my favorite pictures of three topis in the forest. They were lined up as if posing for the camera.<\/p>\r\n

The topis, the hartebeests and the waterbucks are stately antelopes that are one or even two sizes larger than the gazelles and the impalas.  They are magnificent beasts all of them even if my preference is for the topis Then there are the hopping wildebeest with a mane almost like a horse, who are irresistibly funny. I made a movie of the wildebeests hopping and I am attaching it here. For the hartebeests and the topis it was le grand amour<\/em>, but the wildebeasts are so funny<\/p>\r\n

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Three topis lined yp to perfection. One of my favorite picrures.<\/p><\/div>\r\n

We first arrived at the Serengeti lodge after a long and dusty day and just after we arrived at the lodge, the bottom fell out of the sky. Good. We were indoors now. There was going to be one more dreary rain later on in northern Serengeti that we did not need, but it did no harm to our good mood.  This was adventure.<\/p>\r\n

We spent two days in southern Serengeti, and what animals did we not see!  We even saw some ostriches, and more were to come in the Ngorongoro crater.<\/p>\r\n

At the end of the second day in southern Serengeti we drove through a jungle-like forest, going up and up. In the picture on the right It is probably the savanna that can be seen vaguely in the background, and I even think there is a piece of the Rift with Lake Manyara on the left. Very hard to see though.<\/p>\r\n

We finally arrived at the highest point of the mountains surrounding the Ngorongoto crater where the beautiful Lobo lodge in northern Serengeti was welcoming us. <\/p>\r\n