3/7/07 On to Tarangire National Park

We left the Ngorongoro Serena Lodge about 8 AM and traveled around the rim and down to the entrance gate and PAVED ROADS. The vehicle parked beside ours when we prepared to leave this morning was from "Bush buck Safaris" and their motto is "It's rough, It's dusty, but it's an adventure!" That's pretty accurate.

After about an hour we turned off the east/west road and headed south to the Tarangire N.P. At the parking lot at the entrance we searched for a mini-cache while Eustace did the paper work for our entering the park. the cache is rated 4 1/2 stars for difficulty, 1 1/2 for terrain. It was only about 75 feet from where we parked and the write up told us exactly where to look. Why the high degree of difficulty? Well, we searched around the large rock for some smaller rocks to move. A shrub was obscuring the obvious side, and when I finally moved the two rocks to expose the cache I was immediately attacked by a swarm of ants around the cache. At least one bite me. I could see the cache but needed a long pencil that Carolyn had to dislodge it enough so that I could flip it out into the open and make sure there were no ants on it before we opened it. The last previous entry was Feb. 20th --no mention of any ants!

Soon we were on our way into the park. Just past the entrance we saw a Common Waterbuck and its calf. Later, as we toured the park we saw a large number of elephants and several Dik Dik, and lots of birds.

We arrived at the Tarangire Sopa Lodge around 1 PM and checked in and then had a buffet lunch set up near the circular pool. We then rested until almost 4 PM when we went for an afternoon game drive. New birds for the day sere Ashy Starlings, Yellow-collared Love Birds, Bearded Woodpecker, Red-billed Hornbill, and Namaqua Dove. There were two of these doves on the road ahead of us and they were about the size of a sparrow, very tiny. We also saw many species of Francolin. These quail-sized birds were usually seen on or near the road and ran ahead of us rather than fly most of the time. We saw Crested Francolin, Gray-breasted Spurfowl, Yellow-necked Spurfowl, and Red-necked Spurfowl.

Many of the elephants had covered themselves with the local red earth, giving them a very red appearance. We returned to the lodge around 6:15 PM ., We cleaned up, rested for awhile and ate our five course meal from 8-9 PM. We will be off again at 8 AM to explore more of this park.