We had planned for a half day in clinic as we did three weeks ago, and everything seemed to be going well until shortly after 8 am when I received a call from LJ, who was in transit from the US and was to be arriving at the Kilimanjaro International Airport (KIA) in only several hours. Though due to the vagaries of air travel these days, she had booked her flight from Doha to Nairobi and then on to KIA, rather than directly into KIA from Doha. Of course, this was entirely due to the cost of the flights (which we are all effectively paying for) and the confusing price structure the airlines use. In any event, her checked bag was apparently not checked through to her final destination, which it clearly should have been, and she was told that she would have to pick it up at baggage, but to do that, she would have to go through immigration in Nairobi which meant that she would have to buy a Kenya visa to pick up and recheck her bag. If all that sounds incredibly confusing, you’re not alone. LJ has spoken to both Qatar Airways (whom she had flown from Doha) and Precision Air (who was flying her momentarily to KIA) and they both claimed it was the other’s responsibility to figure out how to get her bag on her flight. In the end, I advised her to get on her flight and that we would begin working on how to retrieve her bag.
We had originally planned to go to lunch at Gibb’s Farm, though discovered that they were full due to the high season and couldn’t accommodate us. Plan B, though, was to head to the Galleria for some shopping and an early dinner as the day seemed to entirely get away from us and everyone was a bit frazzled over LJ’s baggage issue. Though she was entirely sleep deprived after her flights and hadn’t eaten since her first flight from Philly to Doha as they had run out of vegetarian meals on her second flight, she still seemed to be in good spirits and was able to hold out until our dinner with only some minor snacks.
We made it home in plenty of time to make our lunch for our game drive to Ngorongoro Crater on Sunday – we had invited our three interpreters to come with us as well and making lunch for the eight of us. We made two peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for each of us, two hard boiled eggs each, two-thirds of a cut up watermelon, and plenty of water. We had a target departure of 6:00 am and would be picking up Novati at the FAME gate and then Zai and Zuhura down at the intersection of the tarmac and the FAME road.
The following morning, we made our departure time within several minutes and picked up the others on our way. There were eight of us in the vehicle, which is pretty much the maximum for a game drive, and we were off for the Lodoare Gate into the Ngorongoro Conservation Area. Well before reaching the crater rim, we up into the clouds and driving through what would have been called pea soup if it were fog along the California coast, with the visibility at a bare minimum for driving in combination with the dusty roads creating a coat of dirt on the windshield. Adding in the multitude of other safari vehicles all in a terrible rush to somewhere sooner and the large trucks heading for the Serengeti and parts beyond, the drive was far from relaxing. Once on the far side of the rim, though, the clouds we were in began to ease up and you see the clouds pouring out of the crater and down the rim. At the descent road, we checked in with our permit and I attempted to wash the windshield with water and the only thing I had to wipe with which was, unfortunately, toilet paper we had with us that disintegrated as I wiped and left small particles of the paper that I hoped would eventually fall off – they were small enough for me not to feel guilty for littering.
We reached the bottom of the crater and began our day of exploration. Rather than describing everything we did in detail, I will share with you the photos that LJ took using my extra DSLR camera and my long 200-500 mm lens. As I was driving, I didn’t do much photography and left it up to LJ.
