Africa Safari: Hippos, Warthogs, Elephants and Baboons.…. Oh My!

There’s been many sto­ries about MM climbers’ excit­ing and great accom­plish­ments on Kil­i­man­jaro, but what hap­pens when you get off the moun­tain and want to cel­e­brate? Epic wildlife view­ing, that’s what! Add on 3 or 5 days to your total trav­el time to Kil­i­man­jaro and get some spec­tac­u­lar up-close game view­ing that you can only imag­ine! Safaris trav­el to the Ngoron­goro Crater, Lake Man­yara and the Serengeti. You’ll vis­it the famous arche­o­log­i­cal site of Drs. Mary and Louis Leakey and spend some time with our Maa­sai friend Olé Dorop and his family.

And with almost 30 years run­ning trips in Tan­za­nia comes some perks, like out pri­vate lux­u­ry camps in the Nation­al Parks we vis­it- we’re talk­ing just you and your Moun­tain Mad­ness team.

Check out the blog below about a recent trip.

(all pho­tos from pre­vi­ous trips)

Jef­frey Dem­mon photo

After a suc­cess­ful ascent of the moun­tain 3 of our 4‑person team head­ed out on our three day safari exten­sion. This safari to the Ngoro­goro Crater Con­ser­va­tion Area was loaded with ani­mal sight­ings! The first day was spent in Lake Man­yara Nation­al Park, where they saw what sounds like a list of exhibits at a zoo: baboons, mon­keys, warthogs, giraffes, hip­pos, water­bucks, many types of water birds, and plen­ty of small birds that includ­ed weavers and bee eaters and stonechats. The group stopped for lunch in a shady spot, watch­ing some mon­keys play­ing near­by. When they fin­ished eat­ing, they heard a sound in the bushes…

Sud­den­ly, they were sur­round­ed by a big herd of ele­phants. They stayed qui­et and watched from the car. At one point, a large female ele­phant walked by oh so close, star­tling a trekker into quick­ly rolling up the win­dow to pre­vent any trunks from find­ing its way into the vehi­cle- this result­ed in a lot of laugh­ter among the group with this close encounter with the locals. After tak­ing lots of pic­tures, the group head­ed out to the camp at Ngoron­goro Misigiyo, where they spent the evening watch­ing a dance by the Maa­sai war­riors and Maa­sai girls.

Imag­ine these as your pic­nic guests! Joyce North­wood photo

The sec­ond day was spent in the crater, with even more ani­mal sight­ings: ante­lope, buf­fa­lo, a pride of lions, zebra, gnu, chee­tah, flamin­go, gazelle, rhi­no, and huge flocks of migra­to­ry birds. They watched a hye­na sniff­ing a sleep­ing buf­fa­lo and saw warthogs pro­tect­ing their young from hye­nas and jack­als! After a pic­nic lunch in the Lerai for­est, they went to the Ngoitok­i­tok spring and saw more lioness­es and herds of buf­fa­lo and antelopes before leav­ing the park. The evening was spent get­ting a tour of a boma and learn­ing about the Maa­sai liv­ing style. 

Joyce North­wood photo

This fan­tas­tic end to an already won­der­ful and suc­cess­ful trip is just one exam­ple of what you can encounter on your adven­ture! And if you have just a few more days the Serengeti exten­sion can add to your expere­ince of the African wilds.