Kilimanjaro - My Journey to the Roof of Africa

Safari (Day 5):

Ngorongoro Crater to Lake Manyara National Park

Wednesday, January 23, 2013

Despite all the food I ate last night and the three cups of tea I drank, I slept really well. I managed to eat sensibly at breakfast. Robert asked me if I were OK with taking an older lady back to the nearest town because she didn't want to continue with her group to the Serengeti. I said, as long as we didn't have to go out of our way, I was OK with it. She was a strange Australian lady. She even asked for a bottle of my water but I told her that I only bought enough for myself for the six days. We dropped her at the bus station in Karangu town from where she could take a bus back to Arusha.

The drive to Lake Manyara National Park was less than two hours. We dropped Ahmed and our equipment at the campground in town. Finally, a developed campground! It has a store, a gift shop, a swimming pool, a restaurant, and a lounge with TV. It's actually really nice here.

We left for our game drive at 10am. The next six hours were spent sitting in the car driving around and not seeing much at all. It seems that this was a complete waste of my money. I've already seen everything I wanted to see anyway. It was way too hot and uncomfortable in the vehicle. We did see three lions on a tree and a bunch of baboons as well as blue and velvet monkeys but other than that nothing exciting happened all day. We visited a hot spring (not the soaking kind though) and had lunch at a picnic spot with a bunch of other tourists.

We got back at the campground at 4pm. I bought a Coke for Robert (since he doesn't drink beer), a Kilimanjaro beer for Ahmed, and a Tusker beer for myself. I've been sitting next to my tent for an hour and a half now. I had some tea, popcorn, and biscuit after the beer and now I'm ready to jump in the shower. There are quite a few travelers here. Most of them are hanging out by the pool.

We ate dinner outside since the weather was so nice. There was a Slovak group next to us waiting for their dinner. When it finally arrived, their guide announced that they were having Chagga (local) food tonight. I wonder how it tasted.

I retired to bed at 8:30pm since there wasn't much to do at the campsite.