Tarangire July 9

Tanzania

Thursday, July 9

Tarangire National Park

We are staying at a tented campground in Tarangire National Park and as I type this I am watching a group of elephants cross the shallow Tarangire River. One of them just made a trumpeting sound.

We went out very early this morning and came across a pride of about 10 lions. They were resting in the shade of some bushes almost camouflaged by the tall grasses around them. At one point one of the young males got up and walked down the road heading right toward our safari vehicle. But as it got close to us it turned and headed over to a lone female. They were a very relaxed group of lions ... not much action but very exciting to watch none the less. At lunch today a vervet monkey came into the lunch area and quickly stole a roll, It was chased away very quickly by the waiters.

I'm impressed by the knowledge and spotting ability of our drivers. Not only are they able to drive on extremely rough and bumpy roads, but at the same time they can spot small birds in the trees. They are able to tell us a lot about animal behavior and characteristics as well. And they very patiently help us with Swahili.

I'm going to transfer this email over to an IBM formatted disk and then the people at the lodge will take the disk to Arusha (back over those bumpy roads) to send it. So far it hasn't worked to try to connect with my own computer and modem. I managed to get busy signals when I tried to send from Zanzibar and ringing but no connection when I tried to send from Arusha. The computer works well, though, for keeping a journal. We see so much everyday it is hard to keep track of the excitement and the adventure without writing it down.

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We are staying at a tented campground in Tarangire National Park and as I type this I am watching a group of elephants cross the shallow Tarangire River. One of them just made a trumpeting sound.
	We went out very early this morning and came across a pride of about 10 lions. They were resting in the shade of some bushes almost camouflaged by the tall grasses around them. At one point one of the young males got up and walked down the road heading right toward our safari vehicle. But as it got close to us it turned and headed over to a lone female. They were a very relaxed group of lions ... not much action but very exciting to watch none the less. At lunch today a vervet monkey came into the lunch area and quickly stole a roll, It was chased away very quickly by the waiters.

I'm impressed by the knowledge and spotting ability of our drivers. Not only are they able to drive on extremely rough and bumpy roads, but at the same time they can spot small birds in the trees. They are able to tell us a lot about animal behavior and characteristics as well. And they very patiently help us with Swahili.	I'm going to transfer this email over to an IBM formatted disk and then the people at the lodge will take the disk to Arusha (back over those bumpy roads) to send it. So far it hasn't worked to try to connect with my own computer and modem. I managed to get busy signals when I tried to send from Zanzibar and ringing but no connection when I tried to send from Arusha. The computer works well, though, for keeping a journal. We see so much everyday it is hard to keep track of the excitement and the adventure without writing it down.