Serengeti, Ngorongoro,South Luagwe, Safari Part 2: The Pride

1) Lions: probably the coolest thing we saw on safari was a bunch of out of control lion sightings and up close encounters.

In Serengeti: we peeled out at dawn and followed the spoor of the lions from our campsite (we camped in tents in the national park so you weren't allowed to leave your tent after bedtime or the lions might get you. This was extra scary to pee-ers like me and I dealt with it through combination dehydration and sleep deprivation.) to where they were all hanging out. Oh hello lions. and there was a male who was sitting around eating a carcass and this female kept coming up to try to get some and he chased her off and then dragged it away. And another couple was mating when we came up and then the female pranced out on the road and was like rolling over and flirting all cute like. And a couple more groups too, alertly looking at like the herds of elephants to think about their lives.

Finally, the post lion scene, which was hyenas knawing on the ribs of the wildebeasts, while vultures dove at another spot where they had dragged some bits off, and the content female who had brought the beast down sat on what is called like lionrocks and look like the thing on the Lion king, yeah so she's just surveying her domain from the top of this rock as the scavengers gnaw on the bones of her kill.

In Ngorongoro: It was so small so you could kind of see the whole prode behaviour one at a time. We came across a male chuffing in the dawn, Apparently they send out a scout for where the herds have moved and then communicate about where to go by this chuffing. Then we saw a female stalking along, probably the selfsame scout, just walking along the ridge scenting the air, she went by us for a long time.

And then we found a male who had gorged himself sleeping, breathing heavy with a distended belly, while the kill lay beside him.

But most of all, there were two females taking a NAP ON THE ROAD. I'm talking literally maybe a metre away, and we just pulled up next to them and sat there and there they were, like full technicolor. And they weren't doing anything, because they were kittens sleeping in the sun, but they would like turn their heads, or flex a paw, and we would be transfixed for the next indefinite time, they made us move on eventually, but to be petting distance from a lion is a bit crazy.

In Luagwe: This was the night drive, so we found three females stalking, looking for something to hunt, so they just walked along, and the driver pulled up so we were perpendicular to them, and they walked right to us in the night while the spotter tracked them with the lights, they had to turn a little to get around us, like full face.


2) Us: So the cars developed special bonds bc we stayed together for the awesoemest bits. And ours was the awesomest car, dubbed team Jambo for the song we sang in greeting and goodbye to each new place.

Jambo
Jambo bwana
Habarigani
Mzurisana
Wageni
Mwakaribishwa
Tanzania yetu
Hakuna Matata

Literally translated to
Hello
Hello mister
How are you?
I am really good.
Guest
A very warm welcome
Welcome to Tanzania
No worries, mate.

Note that the obsessive learning of this song also leads the yodelling yokel ot now have like 3 Swahili conversations with locals.
In addition our car contained-the baby germans, masters of the booty shake (Alina and Vanessa, there was also a team Germany with all the other Germans plus Sally)(and Vanessa also had the best zoom on my camera so when I post my photos someday they will really mostly be hers.), Elaura and Jaspar (the group children, who took all the best selfies and started all the best coordinated dance parties along with Corinne, from team 726 with Terra the numerology master)(Jaspar had also been in Tanzania for like another 3 months teaching schoolchildren, and therefore knew other rad swahili and was btw the only boy on the 20 person tour, and could do a mean accapella of the circle of life) and me and Jes. And Kisamo, our guide, who sent me rad swahili music vids afterwards and told us many cool stories and had no fear of speed limits off road and let us hang out of the roof nonstop cheering, singing and generally making nuisances of ourselves and not believing wild animals can be startled. Which really they weren't.

Much much more could be written about this tour group, which was btw the coolest ever and full of awesome friend groups and dancing and getting off the hook in every bar every night. These kids may have forced me to like a Beiber song.  We danced more than once on a bar. There was various leaping and throwing in pools. Everyone was too drunk a lot. Serenading occured. Our work crew (me Jes Sally and Jaspar) had a playlist carefully constructed by Jaspar himself. Cutthroat games of scattergories were played. Tarot angels were read. It was really really cool.