Travelogue Tanzania 2009
Programme Day 2 – Arusha to Tarangire National Park

Samuel picks us up at the hotel. We buy some water and a couple of cookies and then we start. For the first 80km one may not take pictures but there isn’t very much to see anyway. A bit further down the road Samuel points out the first giraffes, zebras and ostriches. Though they are quite far from the road they’re a little sensation for us.

Only a couple of hundred meters before arriving at our first lodge, the Tarangire River Camp, we get close to the first animals, impalasand a young giraffe. The giraffe stays where it is and watches us as long as we stay in the vehicle. I like to get off thinking that I can get even closer by foot. In all the national parks it is forbidden to leave your vehicle, but here we are outside the park, so Samuel gives me his okay, though he doesn’t like it. However, the second the giraffe sees a human outside of a car, it runs away.

Tarangire River Camp - Giraffe
our first giraffe, a baby

Lunch in the camp. At four we leave for our first game drive in Tarangire National Park. For the first time we get really close to the animals. Tarangire National Park is especially great for the elephants.

Tarangire River Camp - elephants very close to our jeep
One of our first elephants. The giant bull was standing only a meter away from us for a couple of minutes watching us watching him. I was expecting him to touch us with his trunk any second. In this situation even the clicks from the reflex camera appeared loud and we wondered how the elephant would react to it. He could have thrown over the car easily. But he came to the conclusion that we were no threat and not very interesting, either.

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