Okay friends and well-wishers, enough messing around with safaris and red bananas and lounging by a pool. It’s high time we got down the business of scaling some of the bigger peaks in Africa. This post will serve as the kick off for the first of our true hiking experiences during out African adventure. On tap first? Mount Meru, which at 4,566m high is Africa’s fifth highest peak. The purpose of us scaling this lesser peak first was primarily to assist us with acclimatization, as well as giving our lead guide for Mount Kilimanjaro a chance to see how we might perform when it came time to the big show. This climb would take us 4 days and 3 nights, although the only real climbing day would come starting at day 2 starting at midnight. On that day, we’d be going for the summit. However, before we get to that day, I’ll write a post for each of the days we spent on the mountain, but try not to make them too long ;-). Also, since we’re on a mountain now, I’ve got a map to share with you, as well as a set of pictures from the first day itself. Enjoy those, then click on back and read the rest of the story.
Travelogue
Alternatively, I was thinking of titling this post, “Restful Day and Red Bananas”, but I couldn’t help but throw a little literary allusion to my writing for the day 🙂 I’ve been alternating between thinking about blogging about several days at a time vs. one day at a time, and so far, the daily blog seems to be the way I’m going. Takes a lot longer, but there’s lots to talk about when it comes to a once-in-a-lifetime trip. This post is one of the few days where we didn’t really have much on tap. We were slated to visit a local village and do some shopping, and our base for the day was a really cool ‘permanent’ camp where there were tons of blue-balled monkeys running around. Yes, there is a very good reason that they are called that, and if you turn your attention to some of the pictures that were put up from the day, you’ll see why 🙂 As it turns out, this was also really the only chance we’d have at doing shopping for our Secret Santa. Read on for more.
Good news everybody. Today I can finally write about getting out of the safari vehicle and actually doing some real hiking. Mind you, I’m not talking about a multi-day challenging trudge or anything, but at least the dust in my nose would be from kicking at the dirt rather than by driving through it, so that’s something. Our first foray into the hills was a hike up Mount Lemagrut, which is one of 9 craters in the Ngorongoro conservation area. Although we’d be trekking up to 3100m this day, we were starting out at about 2400m, so the overall altitude gain and loss wasn’t going to be that great. This would however serve as our first acclimatization hike of sorts, and give us an idea how we might do as a group on the more challenging days ahead of us. This is also the first time I’ll be sharing a nice map of the trek with you all. As you might expect, I carried a GPS with me for most of the trip, and made a number of maps to show you where we went. Along with the map you can also head to flickr and check out the set of pictures and videos from the day. Once you’ve taken all that in and set the scene, come on back and read the rest of my tale!
Good evening and welcome back to another exciting chapter in the African Adventures saga. Once again, strap yourself into the safari vehicle, as Team Cantrailia was once again taking to the dusty roads in search of more of the ‘Big 5’, and any other animals we could scare up. After a lovely evening at Rhino Lodge, it was now time to make our way to two other very famous Tanzanian destinations. First stop of the day would be the Olduvai Gorge, followed by a visit to the Serengeti. If you’re interested in taking a preliminary trip through the eyes rather than needing to read my ramblings, click on over to Flickr and check the set of images out from the day. As you might already imagine, it was another successful journey, so I’ve got a few interesting little tales of the day to share. Read on my friends, read on.
Okay, so this post isn’t really about walking on the moon. However, it is about spending some quality time in a crater. I’m of course talking about the Ngorongoro Crater in Tanzania, which was the first official stop in our tour of Africa. After all the time spent in transit, it was finally time to get the trip underway in earnest. The first part of our itinerary had us getting in some quality Safari time. This meant a lot of time in a safari vehicle, and an awful lot of dusty roads. However, it also meant some truly amazing scenery and wildlife spotting. Imagine heading to the best zoo you could ever imagine, only take the cages away and let all the animals just roam free and do as they pleased. Yup, that’s a safari in Africa for you. If you’d like to check out pictures from our first day of safari, head on over to flickr and look at the set. Afterwards, click your little self back here and read about my thoughts and impressions of that day.