Monday, May 23, 2005
Honeymoon in Africa - Northern Circuit Safari, Day 4 of 8
Northern Circuit Safari, Day 4 of 8
Serengeti National Park, Tanzania
23 May 2005
This morning we departed at 6:15am for a sunrise game drive. A early morning balloon ride had just gotten aloft and was visible in the distance.
We re-visited some of the areas from the previous day in the hopes that some of the night's action and drama might be discovered (most of the hunts occur at night).
We quickly ran into herds of wildebeest and zebra migrating northwest, as they do this time of year every year.
We also saw group of resident elephants, including several adult males, females and many juveniles. One of the young ones was incredibly small and our guide estimated he was about 2 months old, and he kept nearby what we assumed were his 3 and 5 year old (approx) siblings. The tiny baby elephant was incredible to watch. He was energetic and running around happily and carefree. As he would run around, it was hilarious to see that he had very little control of his trunk at that age. His trunk trunk would flop around in all directions looking like a wet noodle. We watched the elephants, move about, eat, scratch themselves on trees etc. all the while the 2 month old just went running about. Viktoria found him irresitably cute. I agreed.
Next we travelled along the main park road (dirt double track) for for some 200-300 yards and we noticed a pair of hyenas walking directly toward us on the road. We stopped the truck and popped our heads up out of the sunroof to watch them casually walk right past the truck, within 5 feet of us. These animals are fierce and incredibly strong long looking; the neck think as their body and obviously supporting bone crushing jaw muscles. To see them so close was amazing.
We moved on down the road a little bit more, maybe 5 minutes worth of driving and we came upon a young adult male, possibly 2 years old or so. He was one the side of the road and he was licking and chewing and sniffing a clump of grass and a small thorn acacia bush growing in the middle of it. The faces he made were hilarious.
We called it the "stinkface" and it looked like a grimace combined with a frown. The scent he was intently interested in was most likely another lion's scent from spraying, most likely a female in heat, but it
could have been another male too. We've seen our own cats make this face when another "interloper" cat sprays something in our yard. In any case were 5 feet from this male and he barely took notice of us, he was so into the smell of this bush.
He decided to leave the bush as sauntered off down the road in front of the truck. He would stop and make locator calls back to his pride. This call is not what you'd expect from a cat, its more like a dog, more or less a "ruff... ruff.... ruff..." sound but at a very very low frequency and it carries for miles. It it not high pitched like a bark.
We moved on after a time, and visited the Masai Kopjes and found the same mating pair from last evening still there with a fresh zebra kill. I young male from the pride was sitting next to it, simply guarding it, not actually eating it. Vultures perched nearby (50 yards) on the kopje. Then the lion decided to abandon the kill for the shade of some bushes. Yet the vultures remained, they did not swoop down for the kill we expected. Yohannes was surprised at this.
We left the kopje and then headed back in the general direction of the male lion that had made the "stinkface" a while before. We quickly found another different mating pair that were in the tall grass, lying about, flirting with each other. We watched them for about 10 minutes but they did not mate. Yohannes decided to drive down the road a bit, since he thought he spotted a lion about 1/4 mile away approaching. We drove about 2/10ths of a mile and sure enough the lion popped out of the tall grass onto the road in front of the truck. The lion walked towards the truck on the road then around it in the grass then re-enteed the road as he passed by our truck. We realized that it was out stinkface lion from before (the mane and his size was recognizable).
We creeped along and followed him in the truck but we gave him some distance, about 100 yards back so he would not be annoyed by us. Eventually the lion veered off into the grass again and flopped over on his side to rest. He was about 25 feet from the mating pair. These were not competing males but were in what Yohannes called an "alliance". Its not a true pride but these two males have an "understanding" that they are are stronger together than seperate on the savannah. Y told us that its become more common for these alliance and they basically share the spot of "alpha male". The pride is stronger with 2 healthy allied adult males then a single alpha. If another male attacked them, they would defend as a team and stand a better chance of surviving the attack. The previous days mating pair, along with that huge male setting atop the kopje was also an alliance. Aaazingly, they also have an understanding about mating with the females. Somehow, the first male that finds her in season gets to mate with her, and there's no fight. This mating continues every 15 minutes or so for a week, until he's essentially worn out or she's through. If he's worn out, the second male can mate with her if she's willing.
We left the mating pair with the newly arrived co-alpha (his locator calls prior to this must have been directed at this mating pair) and went back to Masai Kppjes where Viktoria saw a femalr on 50 foot high kopjes with a strangling fig growing on top of it. The lioness looked down at us a few times but she wanted to nap and soon put her head down and did so. No cubs were seen but we suspect that they were hiding close by.
Y took us farther south next. It was wide open plains with no herds and he took us up to a small hill that had an amzing 360 degree view overlooking the Serengeti. This was cheetah country but none were seen today. We then turned around and went back the way we came. We stopped under an acacia for shade and had out "box lunch".
We stareted driving back towards the direction of the lodge and found 3 lions guarding a kill. This was an aduly lioness, a younger lioness, and either her sister or younger brother. At one point they dragged the kill farther away making it harder to see. However, we did see the dark gray hair and hooves, and realized that they had taken down a wildebeest. The adult female later veered off from guarding her kill and she started staking a nearby herd of wildebeets and zebras. She hunched down stalking then hiding in the grass, when she suddenly ran right into the pack of animals as they all ran past her. It was mayhem, a blur of animals went by and she could not focus in on any single weakened animal, so rather than over-exert herself on futile effort in the mid day sun, she returned the others. But to wathc her jump into the middle of that herd and watch them react was amazing sight, regardless that she did not make a kill at that moment. Her sagging belly, full of meat, told me that she was not particularly hungry in any case.
We left those lionesses, returning back to the mating pair at the Masai Kopjes from earlier in the day. At this point they were not overly active and simply lounged and napped in the mid-day sun. they breifly looked at us once or twice but would simply flop over onto their sides and nap. The lioness that V spotted earlier, high atop the kopje was also fast asleep laying on her side beneath a large strangling fig tree.
With that we decided to return to the lodge, freshen up, nap and would come back out for a later game drive in the late afternoon. Along the way back we saw an incredible and very funny sight: a lioness was sitting in the crotch of a large umbrella acacia tree, all alone, except for the fact that a group of 6-8 elephants were below her enjoying the shade. What was very funny was that she was obviously nervous and agitated because she wanted to get down from the tree. However this was not an option as she would be forced to jump onto the back of an elphant to get down. She must have gotten up in the tree first, napped then awoke and found her exit blocked by the elephant herd. We could not tell for sure but the elephants did not take any notice of her or simply did not care. An elephant adult has little to fear from a lion so they were simply enjoying the shade of the tree.
We returned to the lodge at 2:30 pm wiped some road dust from our faces and took a short nap.
We went back out at 4pm and drove amongst the vast herds of wildebeest and zebra, with a fading light.
We returned to the lodge, showered, and had a nice dinner around 7pm. We returned back to the room at 9ish, and were asleep by 10. We have a 4:45am wake up call for tomorrow since we have a balloon ride over the Serengeti where no doubt we'll be treated to a completely different view of the plains and the vast migration herds!
Entry by Jeff - Seronera Wildlife Lodge
We re-visited some of the areas from the previous day in the hopes that some of the night's action and drama might be discovered (most of the hunts occur at night).
We quickly ran into herds of wildebeest and zebra migrating northwest, as they do this time of year every year.We also saw group of resident elephants, including several adult males, females and many juveniles. One of the young ones was incredibly small and our guide estimated he was about 2 months old, and he kept nearby what we assumed were his 3 and 5 year old (approx) siblings. The tiny baby elephant was incredible to watch. He was energetic and running around happily and carefree. As he would run around, it was hilarious to see that he had very little control of his trunk at that age. His trunk trunk would flop around in all directions looking like a wet noodle. We watched the elephants, move about, eat, scratch themselves on trees etc. all the while the 2 month old just went running about. Viktoria found him irresitably cute. I agreed.
Next we travelled along the main park road (dirt double track) for for some 200-300 yards and we noticed a pair of hyenas walking directly toward us on the road. We stopped the truck and popped our heads up out of the sunroof to watch them casually walk right past the truck, within 5 feet of us. These animals are fierce and incredibly strong long looking; the neck think as their body and obviously supporting bone crushing jaw muscles. To see them so close was amazing.
We moved on down the road a little bit more, maybe 5 minutes worth of driving and we came upon a young adult male, possibly 2 years old or so. He was one the side of the road and he was licking and chewing and sniffing a clump of grass and a small thorn acacia bush growing in the middle of it. The faces he made were hilarious.We called it the "stinkface" and it looked like a grimace combined with a frown. The scent he was intently interested in was most likely another lion's scent from spraying, most likely a female in heat, but it
could have been another male too. We've seen our own cats make this face when another "interloper" cat sprays something in our yard. In any case were 5 feet from this male and he barely took notice of us, he was so into the smell of this bush.He decided to leave the bush as sauntered off down the road in front of the truck. He would stop and make locator calls back to his pride. This call is not what you'd expect from a cat, its more like a dog, more or less a "ruff... ruff.... ruff..." sound but at a very very low frequency and it carries for miles. It it not high pitched like a bark.
We moved on after a time, and visited the Masai Kopjes and found the same mating pair from last evening still there with a fresh zebra kill. I young male from the pride was sitting next to it, simply guarding it, not actually eating it. Vultures perched nearby (50 yards) on the kopje. Then the lion decided to abandon the kill for the shade of some bushes. Yet the vultures remained, they did not swoop down for the kill we expected. Yohannes was surprised at this.
We left the kopje and then headed back in the general direction of the male lion that had made the "stinkface" a while before. We quickly found another different mating pair that were in the tall grass, lying about, flirting with each other. We watched them for about 10 minutes but they did not mate. Yohannes decided to drive down the road a bit, since he thought he spotted a lion about 1/4 mile away approaching. We drove about 2/10ths of a mile and sure enough the lion popped out of the tall grass onto the road in front of the truck. The lion walked towards the truck on the road then around it in the grass then re-enteed the road as he passed by our truck. We realized that it was out stinkface lion from before (the mane and his size was recognizable).
We creeped along and followed him in the truck but we gave him some distance, about 100 yards back so he would not be annoyed by us. Eventually the lion veered off into the grass again and flopped over on his side to rest. He was about 25 feet from the mating pair. These were not competing males but were in what Yohannes called an "alliance". Its not a true pride but these two males have an "understanding" that they are are stronger together than seperate on the savannah. Y told us that its become more common for these alliance and they basically share the spot of "alpha male". The pride is stronger with 2 healthy allied adult males then a single alpha. If another male attacked them, they would defend as a team and stand a better chance of surviving the attack. The previous days mating pair, along with that huge male setting atop the kopje was also an alliance. Aaazingly, they also have an understanding about mating with the females. Somehow, the first male that finds her in season gets to mate with her, and there's no fight. This mating continues every 15 minutes or so for a week, until he's essentially worn out or she's through. If he's worn out, the second male can mate with her if she's willing.
We left the mating pair with the newly arrived co-alpha (his locator calls prior to this must have been directed at this mating pair) and went back to Masai Kppjes where Viktoria saw a femalr on 50 foot high kopjes with a strangling fig growing on top of it. The lioness looked down at us a few times but she wanted to nap and soon put her head down and did so. No cubs were seen but we suspect that they were hiding close by.
Y took us farther south next. It was wide open plains with no herds and he took us up to a small hill that had an amzing 360 degree view overlooking the Serengeti. This was cheetah country but none were seen today. We then turned around and went back the way we came. We stopped under an acacia for shade and had out "box lunch".
We stareted driving back towards the direction of the lodge and found 3 lions guarding a kill. This was an aduly lioness, a younger lioness, and either her sister or younger brother. At one point they dragged the kill farther away making it harder to see. However, we did see the dark gray hair and hooves, and realized that they had taken down a wildebeest. The adult female later veered off from guarding her kill and she started staking a nearby herd of wildebeets and zebras. She hunched down stalking then hiding in the grass, when she suddenly ran right into the pack of animals as they all ran past her. It was mayhem, a blur of animals went by and she could not focus in on any single weakened animal, so rather than over-exert herself on futile effort in the mid day sun, she returned the others. But to wathc her jump into the middle of that herd and watch them react was amazing sight, regardless that she did not make a kill at that moment. Her sagging belly, full of meat, told me that she was not particularly hungry in any case.
We left those lionesses, returning back to the mating pair at the Masai Kopjes from earlier in the day. At this point they were not overly active and simply lounged and napped in the mid-day sun. they breifly looked at us once or twice but would simply flop over onto their sides and nap. The lioness that V spotted earlier, high atop the kopje was also fast asleep laying on her side beneath a large strangling fig tree.
With that we decided to return to the lodge, freshen up, nap and would come back out for a later game drive in the late afternoon. Along the way back we saw an incredible and very funny sight: a lioness was sitting in the crotch of a large umbrella acacia tree, all alone, except for the fact that a group of 6-8 elephants were below her enjoying the shade. What was very funny was that she was obviously nervous and agitated because she wanted to get down from the tree. However this was not an option as she would be forced to jump onto the back of an elphant to get down. She must have gotten up in the tree first, napped then awoke and found her exit blocked by the elephant herd. We could not tell for sure but the elephants did not take any notice of her or simply did not care. An elephant adult has little to fear from a lion so they were simply enjoying the shade of the tree.
We returned to the lodge at 2:30 pm wiped some road dust from our faces and took a short nap.
We went back out at 4pm and drove amongst the vast herds of wildebeest and zebra, with a fading light.
We returned to the lodge, showered, and had a nice dinner around 7pm. We returned back to the room at 9ish, and were asleep by 10. We have a 4:45am wake up call for tomorrow since we have a balloon ride over the Serengeti where no doubt we'll be treated to a completely different view of the plains and the vast migration herds!
Entry by Jeff - Seronera Wildlife Lodge
