Adventures at Tarangire

Today we went to Tarangire National Park  for a day trip safari as well as an assignment for our Wildlife Management class.  The project was to count mammals, using a rangefinder to determine their distance away from the vehicle in addition to how many were in each transect, a distance of 2 km.  We also were told to bring our bathing suits to swim in the pool at the lodge, and Erica reminded us to shower so that we don’t turn the water a different color.  And no, showering is no longer a routine activity.

We were split up among the four Land Cruisers and each went our separate ways.  My group saw 237 elephants within 16 km, and definitely over 300 elephants throughout the entire day.   

We also saw plenty of giraffes, bright blue starlings, impala, Grant’s gazelle and a jackal. 

 And even palm trees!

One of the other groups however was not so lucky.  They got stuck in the mud and had to push the Land Cruiser a total of 17 times.  They saw plenty of cool tracks from lions and carcasses from their kills, but were absolutely covered in mud, were hours late, and spent the entire day walking barefoot and trying to get where the rest of the group was, aka sipping cocktails at the pool overlooking an incredible view of elephants and baobob trees for miles.  Here's a view from the lodge:

 I was a little skeptical about the pool, as the water was green and you couldn’t see the bottom, but it did smell like there was chlorine in it.  We found some huge bugs and turtles in it though.  I only put my feet in.

Needless to say, I was not jealous of the mud group.  They are now soaking their feet in antiseptic for 45 minutes.  The only part that I imagine was nice about walking through mud all day was to be able to get out of the car, which is forbidden in the national parks.  It feels so surreal to be there yet not be able to get out and walk around.  Sometimes I feel like I’m just watching a movie as we fly by in the Land Cruiser and take note or pictures of what we see rather than actually interacting with the environment. 

It was an extremely long day and we didn’t get back to eat dinner until 9:30.  But because of the incident, combined with such horrible internet access for the past week, we got a two-day extension on our papers!