Tanzania

Lake Manyara National Park, Tanzania. Large critters of all types gather at this huge lake at the base of the Rift Valley wall (background). The pink dots off in the distance in each photo are thousands of flamingoes, wading in the shallow lake.

Near Serengeti, Tanzania. A local Maasai tribesman tends his cattle and a couple of curious tourists - us.

Near Serengeti, Tanzania. A local Maasai girl, standing at the door to her mud (as in cow-pie) house. We spent some time in these; for a house made of poo it actually doesn't smell too bad! This is one of my all-time favorite photos.

Mt. Kilimanjaro, Tanzania/Kenya. The main reason for coming to Tanzania was to climb Mt. Kilimanjaro. At 19,433 feet it's the highest peak in Africa and the largest free-standing mountain in the world. And our first truly huge climb. We chose the Machame Route, which is a little harder than the easiest route. But 'easiest' is a relative term because at the higher altitudes the going is rough, period. This is probably the coldest I'd ever been in my life and the mountain sits almost on the equator! The climb took about 6 days and passed through several ecosystems along the way, from steamy tropical jungle (upper left photo) proceeding clockwise through cloud forests, high alpine, and scrubby brushlands. Above about 15,000 ft it's all just cold barren rock all the way up the volcanic cone, along the crater rim, and finally arriving at the summit (lower left), the highest point in Africa. It's an amazing climb and a good starting point for anyone interested in getting into big-mountain climbs. As a bonus you can book a nearby safari when you're done and enjoy great views of the huge mountain you just climbed (center pic & below).

Serengeti, Tanzania. You really shouldn't come all this way and not take a safari. The Serengeti, the Rift Valley, Ngorogoro Crater, Lake Manyara, and many other world-class wildlife areas are all located within a day's drive of Kilimanjaro. They all feature incredible wildlife in their natural surroundings, up-close and in your face. And it's just cool riding around in one of these open-top Land Rovers. It still amazes me that the lions don't just jump right in through the open roof and devour everyone. As our guide said, " no worries, we got de laziest lions in Africa..." Food for thought when you're broken down in the Serengeti...

Ngorogoro Crater, Tanzania. For a place I'd never heard of before, Ngorogoro left quite an impression. Just the crater alone is impressive - formed by an extinct volcano, it's 12 miles across and over 1,000 feet deep. Now fill it up with lush vegetation, a lake or 2, thousands of big-game animals and a few luxury resorts perched along its edge, and you've got one of the finest wildlife parks in the world! These lions seemed to think so too.

Sometimes the wildlife cooperates and walks right over for a photo. Sometimes they just sleep on without so much as a twitch. But mostly they tend to walk away, and you get way too many photos of animal-butts as a result. We got lucky here and came across a very photo-friendly zebra.

A tender moment for a very dangerous animal. Of all the deadly creatures that we saw on this safari, the only ones that seemed to rattle our guide at all were the hippo's. In fact he didn't even want to stop the Land Rover at this watering hole at all. When he did stop he backed in, kept the motor running, and was nervous as hell till we got going again. For good reason too - hippos are very aggressive and have a hair-trigger temper. Especially mothers with new babies. They're very fast runners and seem to love chasing down and trampling humans- several thousand people are killed each year by hippos in Africa.

Lake Manyara, Tanzania. The big-game parks are pure heaven for bird watchers, none more so than Lake Manyara. This large, shallow lake is right on the birds' migratory path up the Rift Valley, and it attracts birds by the millions. In the photo to the left birds extend to the horizon. There were huge numbers of flamingoes and white pelicans as far as the eye could see, along with more exotic bird species than I could ever hope to identify. And lots of big-game mixed in as well. Very surreal to see so much wildlife in one place.

A "Goodbye" Maasai tribal dance.