Tanzania Day 8: Same Animals, Different Day

We were starting to get frustrated. We'd been at Katavi for a couple of days and only had two more days left on safari. We were grateful for the good sightings we had at Ruaha because we weren't getting much at Katavi. So we decided to change tactics. Rather than go out in the early morning and late afternoon, we decided to sleep in and go out later, staying out all day. Of course, sleeping in meant being ready at 7:30a instead of 6:30a.

We had breakfast in camp which consisted of cinnamon rolls, fruit, omelet, sausage, and tomatoes (an English twist).

While we were eating, the server told us about the python that lives in the roof of the dining area. We'd been eating here for two days, oblivious to the python above.

That definitely got me checking the roof of our banda when we got back to it!

We left out about 8:15a and started our drive by the river where the birds were out.

Yellow-billed stork

Gray heron

Goliath heron

Martial eagle eating breakfast in a tree

We saw Charles and Katie with their guide. We talked to them a bit and they weren't seeing much of anything either.

Palm nut vulture

Hammerkop

Fish eagle

Cape buffalo

The antelope in the background are the elusive eland. I've only seen them a handful of times and never gotten a good picture. They are always running away.

By now it was time for lunch so we stopped off to eat our box lunches of scotch egg, veggie sandwich, and fruit.

We spent most of the afternoon with a herd of elephants. This group looked like four generations together at once.

This one gave us a demonstration of how they knock berries and fruit off the trees.

I was sitting in the back row, as usual, with my zebra hair fly swatter.

We arrived back to camp around 5:30p.

Our little male bushbuck that lived under our banda was out and about.

We were no longer the only ones in camp. Some Canadians joined the camp tonight. They'd been driving around Tanzania for several weeks. At this camp, we still ate our dinner separately but did have drinks and popcorn with them around the campfire beforehand.

For dinner, we had veggie soup to start then beef and mushroom pie, fried eggplant, potatoes, and veggies.

Dessert was an orange meringue pie. Our giggly Masaai guide walked us back to our banda and we were done for the night. Neither of us had the energy to face the scalding hot/freezing cold shower.