Tanzania
Dar es Salaam was pretty much a typical African City. A little dodgy, not that much to see and life lived on the streets.
It seems people were having an outer body experience when they saw Mount Kilimanjaro. It seems to defy all geographical logic but I was not on any metaphysical plain with it.
Arusha was just a gate way to get to the Serengeti. I heard a lot of complaints from other travelers about the pushy and aggressive touts. I have a tendency to compare them to Morocco so I did not find them that bad.
I met up with a chap from Ottawa, a young British guy and a young women from America and we book a game drive (safari sounds too snooty). This was my third game drive and I am 0-3 to see the Big 5. I have seen 4/5 many times but have not seen a leopard.
The Ngorogoro Crater was a long drive to the top and then you see all of these animals in the lush jungle and tall crass (lions were a little tough to spot because of this). After a while I became a little indifferent to the elephants, giraffes, zebras, wilder beast and other mammals. The cats were exiting to see and I am bad person because I was hoping to see a kill. We just missed one. Some females brought down a zebra and we were there to see the big males take the kill from them. Selfish and lazy bastards. I guess this is the price you pay from being protecting from other lions.
Lots of driving, lots of animals, few cats. We did see a rare black rhino.
I was amazed at just how untouched the Masai people are. 2006 and they are still hunters and gatherers. They were approachable and very friendly. Some spoke English and you can see that money is starting to enter their culture (some wanted money for pictures) and the ones at the bus stations were always trying to sell you something. It was interesting to see their villages and their lifestyle. I could not decide if I considered them poor. They had food, good health and a solid family structure. Yet they had nothing but a grass hut their omnipotent Maasai blanket.
|
