And we're back in Dar for a couple of days. A short flight from Zanzibar carried us to the Selous Game Reserve in southeastern Tanzania. What an experience it was... I'm not sure what was better, animals in the wild (of which we intimately saw many) or having an espresso while overlooking the Rufiji River at our spectacularly rustic (yet elegant) camp.

Day #1

Depart Zanzibar at about 8 AM and arrive to the camp (after a few stopovers) around 9:30 AM. From there, we had a guide and driver pick us and one other couple up and proceed to take us into the wild of the reserve. Unfortunately, we didn't see much that first trip, and I was beginning to worry a little about the extravagant cost vs. lack of sight of any other living things... The morning ended as we pulled to our camp and had a personal greeting from one of the managers. We arrived into tent #2, a good ways from the main dining and reception area. Inside we found all the luxuries you would never expect to have in "the bush:" a huge bed, running water, flush toilet, hot (kind of) shower, and 24-hour electricity. As we settled in, we watched an elephant eating in the river about 50 feet away. Things were definitely starting to look much more positive!

After what I swear is the best meal I've had in the country (ingredients arrive 1 time a week after an 8-hour drive from Dar by the way), pork skewers with a light peanut sauce, we headed out for our afternoon activity: a boat safari on the Rufiji. Along the way, we had our first real experience of the wildlife as giraffes, elephants, impalas, and birds of all sorts congregated around the river. We floated past dozens of hippos and crocodile and wrapped it up watching the sun set over the wilderness.

Dinner was nearly as good as the lunch. Champagne was available FYI, though we passed on it.

Day #2

The day started around 7 AM with a wake up "call" which is a camp staffer personally waking you up in your tent and bringing tea, coffee, or whatever it is you've asked for the night before. We had arranged for a walking safari, not possible in the Serengeti mind you, which had to start early because of the heat. In total our camp had 6 or so tents, and all the safaris are capped at 6 guests total. As it happened, this was our only safari that actually had a full group of 6! On top of that, we had our guide and the armed ranger along for the walk.

We were fortunate to happen upon a family of elephants that didn't seem to see us for a good while. Otherwise, we had a relatively uneventful walk. You do get to experience a different side of the wilderness though, just taking it easy. We emerged after a few hours to a surprise breakfast setup under the trees, a really nice touch.

After lunch and a nap, we headed out for another game drive around 4 PM. We hadn't seen many of the big animals like lions, etc. so we were a bit discouraged on that front though lots of free espresso helps. As it happened, we had the driver and guide all to ourselves for our final afternoon safari. We just finished hanging out with a pride of hippos when we got a radio call informing us of a pride of lions. Though the site was quite a ways away and it was starting to get a little late, our guides decided we couldn't leave without seeing at least something more exciting than giraffes and sped off without much further consideration.

We were lucky to have such accommodating guides. Along the way, we spotted a 2-week old giraffe where you could still see the umbilical cord hanging from it's stomach. After that, we stopped to watch a few wild dogs napping in the bush. They're limited to about 4000 in the wild worldwide, much rarer than lions, so that was a great treat. The guides mentioned seeing them only 1 or 2 times a month. Finally, we arrived at the lion site where a dead wildebeest was a long way gone into the stomachs of the pride. It's amazing how close you can come to the lions without them moving or even acknowledging you, even while they are eating. At most, we were 10 feet away in our open-sided car. After sitting mesmerized for a while, we had to race back to the camp as we had only 2 minutes to beat the park-wide vehicle curfew... This against a 45 minute, bumpy drive back! Needless to say, we made it back well after dark but extremely grateful that the staff had gone out of the way to help us see really rare animals.

Day #3
After the excitement of the last day, I didn't think anything else would really compare. As I made my way back to our tent to pick up Emilie after breakfast, I came around a bend in the bush to see her standing perfectly still but with her eyes quite wide in shock. She squeaked out to me and pointed... As I peeked around the last tree, I noticed the camp's resident hippo, Andrea, standing just under the tent next to ours.

You see, hippos are quite dangerous. Apparently, they can run up to 35 km/h and like to charge you when you get too close. We called our resident Masai guard over, and he was even kind enough to let us play for just a bit with the hippo. By play, I mean walk close enough until it started to get upset at which point he raised his stick (not gun or even a knife) to discourage the 2 ton hippo from attacking us... It was a great, exhilarating few minutes! Surprisingly the stick was quite effective.

We left the camp a few minutes later and caught our flight back to Dar Es Salaam.