Safari at Ruaha

Easter vacation! We took advantage of some days off and went on safari at Fuaha National Park, staying at the River Lodge where the bandas are adjacent to the Ruaha River so you can watch the hippos cavorting while you eat and listen to their gruntings all through the night.

We hired Essau as our driver/guide and shared the experience with Giovanna and Laurencia, a young Italian couple. It was a glorious two days of staying in luxurious bandas, eating gourmet food, enjoying the late-summer of the park, and seeing animals. Besides the hippos, there were giraffe, zebra, impala, elephants, baboons, monkeys and--the highlight--lions! On our first day out Essau located an entire pride, including two big males, females and cubs. First we watched them from a distance of 30-40 meters, but then Essau decided to get us up close and personal. We drove very slowly around and through them, hardly daring to breathe, snapping photos while they eyed us. They were bored; we definitely weren't!

In the evening we were summoned from our bandas for supper by Eliazee, a young Massai warrior who was our evening escort through the darkness. From the riverside dining room we watched the full moon rise over the Ruaha while we sipped Manhattans before our meal.

The next morning Essau took us on another ride through wildlife, and when he showed us fresh lion tracks on the road, we knew we were once again going lion hunting. We enjoyed our second lion sighting, this time two large males napping under the bushes alongside the track. They barely even acknowledged us.

We left the park shortly before noon and journeyed on to visit the museum of Mkwawa, the great 19th century Hehe chief who fought the Germans. Very interesting! The museum's advertised claim to fame is that it displays Mkwawa's skull, but we also found a collection of his
possessions and a guide who delivered a wonderful history of the Hehe-German wars.

Now we're back "home," doing a little house-cleaning and prepping for classes which resume again tomorrow. It was difficult to return to our modest little house after living in luxury for two days; it'll also be difficult to get back into the responsibilities of teaching after the long Easter break.