Ngorogoro Crater Area

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Day 9

The Ngorogoro Crater is a world unto itself.  The largest intact volcanic caldera in the world, its was the home of the Masai tribe.  A rich area for grazing their cattle year round with a lake at its center.  Although at some point it became part of the national park system, twenty years ago many Masai lived in the area but as the tourism industry grew and the push for conservation and protection of animals increased, the Masai were forced to live outside the caldera although they were still permitted to use it for seasonal grazing.  Then about 10 years ago, grazing also was prohibited and they no longer had access to their ancestral home.  It is s story unfortunately repeated throughout history and similar to what occurred in the United States which forced its native tribal population off their lands and confined them to far inferior territory reserved for them on “reservations”.

Marshland in crater
The lake at the base of the caldera with flamingoes

No wonder those in power wanted to have sole control over it — it is an absolutely magnificent rich area of animal and bird life, a small self-contained piece of paradise, it holds in its circular bowl a central lake which increases and decreases in size depending on the annual rainfall, tall glass. Flowering bushes growing from its rich alluvial soil and at one end there is a small forest.  Ringed by blue-purple craters walls, once you descend on a stone-lined road down to its depth, you find a microcosm of the animal and bird wealth of this country.   There its a stiff fee for entering the park which theoretically is used for maintenance and there are a never ending line of vehicles coming down and traversing its dirt roads.  

As soon as we reached the floor we saw a group of vans in a flat area surrounding a male lion calming sitting and relaxing in the warmth of the day.  There are many zebras, wildebeest, gazelle, warthogs within its cup and an incredible display of water birds at the edge of the late, including flamingoes who display bright pink strips on their wings when they open them and fly, the beautiful gray-crowned crane, which is the national bird of Tanzania, egrets and many other birds.

Our van around the lion

Along a creek we also saw two groups of huddled female lions, relaxing together. There were many zebras, including those using a “scratching stone” which they shared for rubbing their heads and necks on the rough surface. We also saw a group of two different species of vultures feasting on the remains of the skull of a large animal, wildebeest or buffalo.

Vulture group feeding on animal skull

We came to a public picnic area near the edge of the water but everyone was told they should eat inside their vehicles because of the large Black Kite birds that would swoop down to steal food and could cause serious injury in the process.  So we broke into our usual boxed lunches, dry chicken sandwiches for everyone (as we continue to stay away from fresh uncooked vegetables) except lentils and rice for myself, sometime potato chips, boxed fruit drinks and bananas for dessert.  Marge needed some air and was the only one who sat on a picnic bench near us but we could see the shadows of the kites as they swooped between the sun and those few people eating outside.  But she had no problems.

However, later on, some of us did.   My vehicle with my family and Pat exited out of the Ngorogoro Conservation Area and passed by an area of Baboons and we were told to keep our windows shut.  We stopped by a very large Baboon by the side of the road with a baby who was chewing on a fruit drink box, I took a photo, below, and we wondered about what irresponsible tourists had allowed this to happen.  

Later we learned that our other vehicle had stopped and parked at the exit so our guide could show his pass and several people in the van wanted to go to the toilet so they opened the door to head out.  As soon as they did, 3 large baboons jumped in and reportedly “filled the van”.  Marge, at the back, immediately went into her jujitsu mode after her years of training, and hit and then kicked the Baboon full force.  But the baboons grabbed two bags of garbage before exiting the vehicle.  Thus, it was our very own juice box that ended up in the hands of the baby baboon!  And our guide told Marge that it was very dangerous to hit a baboon.  

The national bird of Tanzania

A word about garbage:  it has not been easy to deal with garbage, even at the places we are staying.  As any open garbage container could be attacked by animals, people are expected to take all garbage out of parks with them.  At the camps, the refuse is collected by staff in the restaurant area and there is usually a small waste receptacle in the tents.  But our group learned the truth of the warning (not strongly enough given to us) about keeping food in tents.   At least four people in our group had their back packs or food containers chewed into by animals, apparently some kind of small rodent, without them knowing when or how it happened.  I had given my nylon bag with my breakfast food specifically for “safekeeping from animals” at our place in Central Serengeti and it was put in the enclosed “bar” area.   But in the morning it had been chewed into and I had to discard quite a bit of it.  Ann and Shira had their back packs torn where food had been sitting at the same camp and Pat also had the inner pocket of her backpack chewed open without any idea where or when it happened.  Survival of the fittest is ongoing and those little creatures have developed a finely tuned sense of smell for tourist food.

I heard from a friend receiving these posts that I did not mention our leopard sightings! We had two. One of them was in a tree where the leopard was stretched out looking like a log and many people could not see it. But Drake managed to catch a photo from a long distance and we can even see its spots. The second sighting was at a base of a tree where it was almost invisible but then it finally got up and stretched and “showed its spots” as they say.

Drakes’ long distance leopard photo

We arrived after another exciting day at our beautiful lodge in Karatu. And we are happy to rest. Although we were told we need to have breakfast at 6 and plan to leave at 6:30 for our cultural tours tomorrow morning

Our guides and the guys in our group