Ngorogoro Crater

  We drove out of Serengeti National Park this morning and as we chatted up a storm, Sandra suddenly exclaimed from the back seat, "Wait, wait - Chris, stop, stop!!  It's a leopard!!!"  And all the rest of us, sitting in front of her, had missed it!  Even our driver, Chris who has 40/20 vision it seems, was concentrating so hard on his driving that he went by without seeing it.

Sitting on a termite hill (there are millions of them!) right beside the road, was this marvelous cheetah (Sandra was close - it was a cat!)  He got up and posed -

and then walked alongside the road right over to another termite hill, which he proceeded to check out, and then moved on through the field.  The 2 other cheetahs we've seen haven't been so close so this was a huge treat!!  And Sandra won the 'Spotter of the Day' award!!

Our next stop was the Ngorongoro Crater, the largest intact caldera in the world!  We came onto the rim and right there before us was the 102 sq. mile crater floor.  It was formed about a million years ago when the top blew off this volcano and now the floor is covered with volcanic ash, a soda lake, grasslands, some watering holes and some forest.

The third couple in our group is Albert and Iris, from Lac La Biche.  What are the chances that we'd come to Africa and be teamed up with another couple from so close to our homes?!!  Chris, our driver, is in the middle of the picture.

And 180 degrees away from our group picture, some local herdsman were taking their cows up out of the crater where they bring them twice a week for water.  The crater is 600 metres deep and these cows just slowly walked up the sides of it.

We met 2 groups of donkeys, loaded with saddle bags full of water containers,  coming up the road too.  Water is such a precious commodity here - it's humbling to see how much it is valued by people in the countryside.

The crater is very, very dry and many animals have moved out because of the drought.  At first glance it looked almost empty but as we drove around the roads, we found lots of surprises, including this pride of about 10 lions that was very concentrated on watching the herd of Cape buffalo moving across the grassland savannah.  There were at least 4 cubs with the group and Chris thought they might be closing in on a hunt but during the 30 minutes or so that we watched, nothing really developed.

Wherever a little creek runs, things immediately grow and the land greens up.  This twisted trunk of a yellow fever acacia tree was interesting.

And then we had to climb up the one-way road and get to the top of the crater to find our hotel.  You can see how the road switchbacks to make the grade.  Our Toyota safari vehicle had to go into four-wheel drive to make it out.  And tonight our hotel balcony looks out over the crater - truly a magnificent sight!