Tarangire, Tanzania

Our first full day in Tanzania was spent at Tarangire National Park, a great kick off to a great trip. Matooke Tours did a fabulous job with arranging our itinerary and lodging, and supplying us with a wonderful tour guide.

Thanks Matooke Tours!

We had a short wait outside of the entrance to Tarangire so we broke out the bird book. Here are a few of the cuties Jen was able to capture on camera.

Red-checked Cordon Bleu

Yellow-collared Lovebird

Superb Starling

Then, right inside the gate, elephants! I was amazed at how close we were able to get tot he wildlife... and this was just the start!

A short drive deeper into the park brought us to a herd of zebras drinking from a pond. They seemed a bit skiddish, approaching the water then darting away... and there were several tour trucks on the far side of the lake... so after a few pictures of the zebras we drove to where the other tourists were gathered. Lions! Lions eating a wildebeest! Wow, just like on National Geographic! I'm still amazed at the animals we saw.

Our lunch spot gave us a beautiful overlook of a dry river. We were told that the elephant can still get water down there by pawing at the ground. This, to me, is what I expected Africa to look like.

That is a leopard up there. We saw three leopards on our trip, and they were all dozing in trees. They were very hard to spot, and without our guide, I would have missed them all.

The giraffe, on the other hard, you couldn't miss. They were huge! I did not realize how big these guys got. I can't remember where exactly we spotted this one, they were inside and outside the parks. We actually saw several during our drives between the three parks we visited, but I think we saw him the first day so I'm including his picture here.

We stayed the night at Sangaiwe Tented Lodge.

The view from our tent's porch.

This was nothing like any of the tents I've ever been in. All of our accommodations were magnificent!

Next post will be The Serengeti!!!