Ngorongoro Crater

Christmas (Winter) Break is a pretty big thing in the teaching community. You get two weeks to be away from 20 needy (or more) children and time to catch up on your sleep. In the international community it's an even bigger deal because two weeks is enough time to jump on a plane and see your family that lives 18 hours away. Or (much to my mother's dismay) you could jump on a plane heading south and go on your second safari in two years and not go home. Read More...

My friend Danielle and I planned a 5 day safari with an extra week on the end to relax. We headed out on a flight to the Kiliminjaro Airport with two other friends. Cheryl and Chase went on safari with me last year in Kruger National Park, but this year they were heading out to climb the tallest mountain in Africa. Which is not really my thing. Driving around in a car searching for wild animals- yes. Climbing up over 19,000 feet to the top of Kiliminjaro- no thanks.

Our driver picked us up from the airport after I was inexplicably held for much longer at immigration in order to receive a full page visa I don't think I paid for. Extra souvenir- awesome!

We headed away from Kilimanjaro and headed straight for Ngorongoro Crater. The crater, which is named after the Maasai phrase for "Gift of Life" is a protected area of the Ngorongoro Conservation Area. It is known for the huge animal wildlife roaming inside the crater that was created approximately 3 million years ago by a collapsed volcano.

We got to our lodge late at night but woke up early enough to watch the sun rise over a pretty spectacular view.

We jumped in our traveling accommodation for our trip and descended into the crater.

We started off with glimpses of gazelles, guinea fowl, and even a small jackal. But, we soon turned a corner and saw two cars waiting. As they moved on and we slowly drove past, we saw our first lion!

She was hiding in the shade behind some prickly thorn bushes, but she couldn't completely hide. We were so lucky! A lion on the first morning! Little did I know...

Ngorongoro has a huge population of animals all situated within the crater. It is amazing to see some of them interacting together, such as this gazelle and warthog chasing each other around.

We drove by a weird green lake before spotting the fact that it was full of lounging hippos.

We also could see our lodge right at the top of the ridge!

Constantly in the distance was a pink horizon line, which struck me as quite odd until learning that there is a huge population of flamingos! We couldn't get any closer but it was so bright even from so far away.

Ngorongoro has the highest density population of Masai or East African lions. Seeing as I really didn't do much research, I had no idea.
But, you may or may not know that lions are my favorite animal! During my South African safari last winter break, I was lucky enough to spot some lions, but from very far away. I was astounded that now I had seen two on my first morning!
The greatest part was just watching the animal population continue to just do their thing. This lion was lounging in the cool mud while the wildebeest continued to graze, all while keeping their eye on the predator.

And he even wandered away to find another friend! Three lion spottings now!
We drove away after they were living up to their name of lazy lion a bit too much, but just to find another group!
I, of course, was over the moon.

We were also lucky enough to spot a rhino! It is always a lucky sign as they are extremely endangered, with a population of around 25 in the park.

In the early afternoon, we once again spotted some lions. Getting old yet?

It can never get old! Look at that yawn!

"Get out of my crater!"

We got our first giraffe spotting after leaving the crater. There aren't any giraffes inside the crater, although they can sometimes be found on the rim. They have such a strange walk that I can't imagine them scaling down the side of the steep crater rim.

Tanzania is filled with conservation areas, with one fourth of the land set aside for this conservation purpose. Bordering the Ngorongoro Conservation area is another famous park and I couldn't wait to begin the next part of our safari...