Safari 2011: From the Western Corridor, north to the Mara River

Monday, 24^th January

Today we drove back to Banagi, then north up the middle of the park to the Mara River, near the Kenya border and Masai Mara National Park. The bush becomes thicker and the grass longer as one drives north. The acacias are in bloom and everywhere is green. We saw small herds of zebra, topi, impala, troupes of monkeys and the occasional giraffe from time to time, but not much else. The road was fair, though occasionally boggy or deeply rutted. The main feature of the day were the tsetse flies who follow any moving object and swarmed the car every time we slowed down to take a photo or negotiate rough stretches of road. These pests are far more of a nuisance than mosquitoes in the Serengeti and carry a less easily transmitted but worse disease than malaria, called sleeping sickness. Recently there was a case at the Serengeti Research Institute. One of the research assistants was thought to have malaria and treated for that, but it turned out to be sleeping sickness and he had to be flown out for emergency treatment. Luckily it isn’t as prevalent as malaria because there is not much one can do to protect oneself beyond constantly flicking oneself or rolling in mud like the animals do! They are like horse flies and are impervious to bug repellent.

'Castle of Clay' or termite mound.

Kongoni

Dikdik

Zebra and topi

The drive took longer than we had expected and deteriorated considerably once we were on the final stretch of road from Tabora B to Kogatende. We located the air strip near the Sayari Camp without much trouble, however, where to go after that was impossible to determine. A ranger from the ranger post at the air strip came out and tried to explain, but it didn’t help, because there are no signs and the roads are so eroded that they have multiplied. Add to that the tracks made by tourist game runs and so forth and one has no idea which one to take. Our cell phone didn’t work as the signal was not strong enough. Luckily Jo and Barbara, our hosts at Sayari, were looking out for us as we’d spoken to them earlier in the day. Jo spotted us in the distance setting off in the wrong direction from the air strip and came out to find us and guide us to the camp.

We were given a lovely welcome by Jo, Barbara and their staff at the camp, where we are once again the only guests. It’s a permanent, luxury camp with all mod cons. Only the canvas walls and fly sheets make it a camp. We swam in their lovely swimming pool fashioned from the rocks of a kopje to cool off and relaxed until supper. We ate the best meal in several days with our hosts, listening to the lions grunting nearby, then went to bed early after a long and tiring day.