I landed in Kilimanjaro (JRO) and was kindly greeted by my outfitter. Easy ride to my hotel where I slept for 8 hours. Overall, so far so good and all the drama I worried about with airline travel did not affect me or my flight in anyway. My flight report is at the end of this post for anyone that wants to read it.
This year I have two groups for Tanzania. One a private group and one a regular workshop. Donna Bourdon assisted me with both after Paul McKenzie had some issues with his eyes. Donna was a great assistant!
Our first stop on the tour was Ndutu. At this destination, our targets were lions in trees and flamingos on the lake. The birding in and around Lake Masek and Lake Ndutu is off the charts. The group had plenty of species to choose from.
On our second evening in Ndutu we were treated to three lionesses and one cub climbing down an acacia tree right in front of us…….in the rain to boot!
But my favorite photo session in Ndutu was on our last morning. We had early morning mist on the lake with plenty of flamingos. And if that wasn’t great enough, we had several hyenas in the water fighting over a wildebeest head and rib cage!
From Ndutu, we drove to the central part of the Serengeti. Our sightings included a lion up a tree and a leopard up a tree. Both were snapshot moments, but nothing panned out. Overall, the camp was fantastic at that location, but we had limited sightings, so it was good that we were only there for two nights.
After our short stay in central Serengeti, we went to the eastern part of the Serengeti. Right off the bat we located a record 14 cheetah. Nine of them were in one morning. We also photographed Side-striped jackals that are a bit larger than the Black-backed jackals that we usually see in the Mara. They are also nocturnal, so we were fortunate to have seen them.
Other sightings included a large male leopard, huge herds of wildebeest, zebra, and Grant gazelle. On one morning, we followed as a large lion chased another huge male until both were so exhausted they couldn’t even face-off. Apparently, they had fought the night before as there were claw marks and fresh blood on the one lion.
We watched as a cheetah chased a gazelle but missed as the gazelle made a hairpin turn at the last second and saved her life. We also watched as a cheetah almost walked straight into the clutches of a lion. We wondered why the lion hadn’t made any attempts to stalk it. But after the cheetah ran away, we saw that the lion had a small wildebeest that it was dragging— he looked at us as if we wanted his meal… no thanks!!
Overall, we had some amazing sightings, some of which were very thrilling. We were also blessed with fantastic weather. Cool breezes and only one tiny sun shower that ended in less than 10 minutes!
Most of the time we had every sighting to ourselves. We travelled with two amazing guides that could literally spot anything that moved. I’ll be leading a second group in a couple of days. Fingers crossed we continue to be blessed.
Below are some of my favorite images so far from the first group.
I captured this shot at last light as small pockets of sunlight hit the cubs face.
FLIGHT REPORT:
Because of the flight issues and airport lines and airline cancellations, I thought I’d share my travel log from Newark International Airport to Kilimanjaro International Airport via Istanbul.
My first booked flight was with United airlines via Frankfurt, and early on that flight was cancelled. I rebooked a flight with Kenya airlines but the only dates I could get did not coincide with my travel group so I would have had to take a domestic flight on my own to catch up to the group…not ideal as the leader. I then found a flight with Turkish airlines that would get me to JRO (Kilimanjaro) a day before the group- bingo! So, I booked that flight and only lost about $600 on the Kenya airlines booking.
I arrived at Newark 3 hours early, even though I had a 1:35 am flight. Terminal B was not really busy but there were tons of cars lining up the road on our way into the airport— this is usually only the case on busy travel days. But my terminal was not hectic at all. In fact, with Star Alliance Gold, I walked up to the front of the medium sized line and was checked in without an issue. I got through the short security line without waiting more than 10 minutes.
The flight was delayed 1 hour due to a gate change, but boarding was quick. Initially, I had booked an aisle seat but was switched to a middle seat just before boarding. What the heck!!! Turns out the man who got my seat is a diabetic and requested an aisle seat at the gate - they gave him mine. I complained to the flight attendant and she changed my seat. Kind of bizarre because they could have just given him that empty seat???
Other than that tiny glitch, the flight was uneventful and landed on time. My quick connection in Istanbul was again uneventful (just how I like my flights!).