Tarengari National Park
Day 3 Safari
1/10/13
Tarengari National Park was the next stop on our great safari adventure. We left the Ngorongoro Crater during the mid afternoon, and our two vehicle caravan drove a few hours away to the Tarengari park entrance. Our lodging for the evening was on the opposite side of the Tarengari National Park, which meant we drove through the park in the evening hours simply to get to where we were staying. We then woke up the next morning and drove back through the park on our way back to Moshi. Our introduction to Tarengari was simply fantastic. Upon our entrance, we quickly came in to contact with a herd of elephants that was significantly larger in number than anything we saw at Ngorongoro Crater. It was also much closer proximity to our vehicle. At one point on our drive through the park, our vehicle had to be thrown into reverse as we were charged by a large elephant. The elephant was impressive in it’s size. It was bigger than our vehicle and, one got the sense that if it wanted to, it could flip our car over without much effort. Fortunately, after our hasty retreat, a second vehicle came along and braved driving past the elephant. We followed hastily in their tracks.
Shortly thereafter, we arrived at our lodging for the night. Our accommodations for the evening were as fantastic as they were unique. We stayed at a resort where, in effect, we were in a tent on stilts with screen walls and a thatch roof. The only thing standing between us and whatever wildlife wandered through the compound was a set of steps, a safety bolt that latched the two doors together, a whistle, a flashlight, and hired Masai villagers who patrol the grounds at night. We were given strict instructions not to leave our room after dark without calling for an escort. Fortunately for us, our room had all the amenities one would need for a relaxing evening, including a restroom, shower, sinks and comfortable beds with mosquito netting as a canopy for added protection.
Our evening drew began with our group convening at the main lobby area for a dinner of traditional foods. We ate po, which is a doughy substance that you roll into a ball and then indent with your thumb to use it as a spoon to scoop up curry. The meal was wonderful and the service was great. We learned that our group of nine travelers were the only ones in the camp that evening, which meant we had our run of the place. After dinner, we retired to sit around a campfire and talk amongst ourselves. When we were ready for bed, we informed one of the guards who escorted you back to your tent armed with a flashlight and a gun, a bow and arrow, or a spear.
The next morning we were treated to a breakfast of eggs and sausage (which is actually much more like a hot dog) before getting back in our vehicles for our day long adventure in Tarengeri. For this day, we did some shuffling of vehicle assignments. Deb and Greg joined Therese, Justin, Beth and Jake in Joe’s vehicle while Sun Woo, Tami, and Ken rode with Eric. We later learned that our reshuffling was the topic of some consternation for our guides as they felt perhaps we were unsatisfied with the service they’d been providing, but in reality it was much more a function of wanting to spend some time on Safari with Justin and Therese since we had spent much of the previous day separated.
With our new vehicle assignments settled, we entered the park An immediate difference between park and guide experiences was the number of birds to be seen at Tarengari, and the expanse of Joe’s knowledge about the birds and the animals of the park. Joe was a veritable encyclopedia of knowledge about the animals, their behavior, and their anatomies. We saw birds of all shapes, sizes, and colors. Their names were unfamiliar, but their numbers and variety were impressive.
In addition to the birds, we also saw a number of termite mounds, small animals, and panoramic views of grasslands and trees. As we moved deeper into the park, it quickly became apparent that there would be no shortage of elephants to be seen in the park. We spent approximately one hour watching a group of elephants (actually two families sharing a watering hole according to our guide) as they ate grass, bathed in the muddy water and appeared to socialize. Though they were smaller than some of the elephants we saw at Ngorongoro, these pachyderms were no less impressive or majestic. As we sat quietly, you could hear as they grasped grass with their trunks and ripped it from the ground. The younger elephants stuck close to the older ones, but they put on a fun show waving their trunks, sitting down like a dog would sit and laying on the ground. The elephants seemed aware, but entirely unfazed by our presence. There were no signs of aggression from the animals, and we felt extremely fortunate to be so close to such magnificent animals.
In addition to the elephants, the other highlight of the large game to be seen at the park were the giraffes. We saw giraffes in the bushes, giraffes standing near trees, and giraffes in the middle of the road. Some giraffes were by themselves, and others were in groups of two or three.
We rode through the park in awe of what we saw. We were told by Joe that we saw more than half of the 3,000 elephants in the park . It was a challenge at times to not take for granted just how frequently we saw them. Interestingly, the elephants were different colors in different areas of the park. We learned that this is mostly a function of the type of soil they roll around in, and it was a matter of seeing different types of elephants in the same park.
After a tremendous day driving through the park, we ate lunch near the park gate. There were monkeys that needed to be monitored and your food was not safe to be left alone. We were cautioned not to leave the park entrance area. You could see elephants walking across the road just a hundred yards from where we sat eating our lunch.
The adventure was not over once we left the park. As we made our way back to Moshi, Joe informed us that we had a tire with low pressure. About a half an hour away from Moshi, the tire gave out and we pulled to the side of the road for a tire change. Jake assisted and the rest of us monitored our gear, which was sitting on the side of the road. Some young children passing by seemed to take an interest in our circumstances, and one of them even asked Beth for her watch. We couldn’t help but reflect on how fortunate we were to have experienced the flat time outside of the park as it would have been a bit scary to be stuck amongst some of the animals that we saw while trying to change a tire amongst them.
Our reflection on the experience? We loved it so much that one of our first orders of business upon our return was to talk to Lynn and Evans about securing a guide for a third day of safari the following day. Needless to say, we had caught the safari bug, and we wanted to take every opportunity to soak in the other worldly environments that exist in this part of the world.
