Out Of Eltisley

0700 departure for Ngongoro Crater NP & Serengeti on pair of Toyota Land Cruisers.  Ascending to a few thousand metres, we entered the thickest fog since late-night taxi rides home to King’s Ripton, Cambs.  

Travelling between Thompson’s Gazelle, wilderbeast & [thus] Zebra (they stick together utilising the Zebras good eyesight & the wilderbeast’s olfactory excellence), a lion emerged from the grass, 40m away, walking straight towards the slowing wagon, with another adolescent male soon after. We stopped of course, & after coming to sniff about, one sat 30m ahead in the middle of the road in a perfect dominant feline position, and the other rubbed itself on our rear bumper & plonked down in the shade.  11am, the crater warming up, we’d seen what we came to see, & we hadn’t entered the Serengeti yet.    Click to continue »

A contact within an hour of leaving Heathrow – Sam from Mombassa – but who can you trust? A good writer could take this toward the bloodfilled lost-in-translation tribal thriller so popular these days.  I probably won’t take this anywhere, but use this & everything else from hereon as the educational module of my 15 month contract with an overland adventure company.  ‘Things weren’t like they used to be’ – (tarmac roads, mobile phones & credit cards) – something this new tour leader hates to hear.  But what is there left for us?  The quest to follow in Livingstone’s footsteps as well as style with the wax-curled explorer moustache.   Click to continue »