Animals of the Serengeti (well a few)

I love safari. I have managed to experience quite a few, all up to now in Kenya. We have been to Tsavo, both East and West, Maasai Mara, Samburu, Amboseli and Mountain Lodge on the foothills of Mount Kenya. I have seen the Big Five on more than one occasion but sadly in Tanzania it was not to be. The problem in the Serengeti is the ban on off road driving. There is a perfectly good reason for this ban, they are trying to preserve the grasslands and stop erosion and destruction by four wheel drive vehicles. In the reserves of Kenya there are many many tracks which can be used in order to get close up to the animals, but in the Serengeti the tracks are few and far between. Our guide/driver was kind enough to sneak off road to enable me to get this photograph of a lovely Cheetah, but it is the only really good close-up I got.



It is rare to see a hippo out of water in the day time and this one reminded me of myself on the way to the pool! We did have a remarkable experience one day when the guide to me down to the river (on foot) where a hippo had killed a crocodile. Apparently the croc had attacked and killed the hippo baby and the mother hippo went crazy and killed the croc. She was lying beside the crocodile and took a bite out of it which is also unusual because hippos are vegetarians. It was quite a sad sight especially as we could also see the baby hippo floating alongside the crocodile. I will post the pics after this so you can bypass the photos if you are at all squemish.

A safari would not be a safari without lions and we did see several, but not up close enough for me, still this was a big pride with an enormous male who seemed to be camera shy

Another rareity, a one eared giraffe!

To me this picture just says AFRICA an Umbrella Acacia standing on its own in the vastness of a remarkable land.