After a few nice free days in Iringa filled with shopping and fast internet we were ready to begin our safari. We were all stoked to be going to Ruaha National Park, the second largest National Park in Africa! Our journey began hopping in a sick Land Rover Safari Station Wagon and a three hour drive to Ruaha. We all fell in love with Iringa yogurt so we bought a ton for the drive over there. The ride was beautiful, we passed through towns and villages with everyone yelling “MUZUNGUS”, everyone was beyond friendly. We arrived at the National Park and within twenty minutes of being in there we spotted two female lions, relaxing in the grass. We were in awe and decided to whip out our cameras and capture the moment that will forever be known as the Simba. Naraska, our kind guide through the safari showed us to our Bandas, two people per banda. We threw our stuff down and headed to lunch. On our way to the dining hall to eat lunch we saw giraffes also known as twiga.The Twiga were beautiful, and of a different pattern than most. For lunch we enjoyed rice and vegetables for the vegetarians and the carnivores enjoyed rice and chicken, yum! After lunch we saw a big family of elephants, I had never seen elephants so big with huge, long tusks. They were amazing. As we passed through we saw about three zebras together then began to talk about whether they are white with black stripes or black with white stripes. Naraska told us that they could be either, the way you can differentiate the two is by the first color of the stripe above their nose. If it was black they were black with white stripes, if it was white they were white with black stripes! Not only was it beyond amazing to see all of the animals but the landscape was absolutely beautiful. There were Acacia trees, Baobob trees and phobiasandelabra trees. The phobiasadelbra tree is the poison tree that looks like a cactus. Even if we weren’t stopped looking at the animals we were appreciating the ginormous sky wrapped around us.
Colin became extremely amused once again to see the Guinea Foul. Instead of just one at River Valley, it was a family of Guinea Foul perched up in the bushes. Colin immediately grabbed my camera and started to take a million pictures. We began to brainstorm ideas on how he could transport one back to the states with him. None of the ideas seemed to reasonable so he was left to just admiring them. Poor Colin, maybe one day we can help him make this dream come true.
Throughout these three days at Ruaha National Park we have all learned more about the animals living here and conservation. There are about 112 rangers in this park to protect the animals. We learned that the some of the animals leave the park and get killed by poachers. For example 1-2 elephants are getting killed everyday. It’s much more difficult for the poachers to get inside because of all the rangers but once the animals leave the park it becomes a major threat to their lives. With that being said Ruaha National park is doing a great job in the park, protecting the animals inside the park grounds.
These few days at the safari were incredible and now we’re all ready to begin our journey for free travel.
Kwaheri y’all!