Lake Manyara National Park Part 1

A lot of People pass this beautiful park because they are in a hurry to get to the Serengeti. We decided upfront that we didn't want to go to the Serengeti because it wasn't the right time and we prefered to go to less touristic parks in the north and south. We didn't regret this decision for a moment. It was really beautiful. Not only we visited the park by car but the day after we also had a ride on a mountainbike through the park, mostly on the open area near the saltlake. That was so amazing. Only on a bike,  just enjoying the giraffes,wildebeast and zebra's with no camera between us. Amazing.

The parks is not big. Only 330km2. 2/3 of the park is water but at this moment the lake was dry for a big part. Around the park you have mountains. If you enter the park you go through forest with high vegetation and trees. In this part of the park you mostly see birds and monkey's. 

Baviaan

Blauwe meerkat

Neushoornvogel

Baboons(bavianen)

Velvet Monkey(groene meerkat)

Me?......I did not eat the green stuff.........

After the forest the area has a lot of bushes. There you'll vind a lot of bushboks, antilopes, dikdiks.

 Dikdik Antilope

The dikdik is a very small kind of Antilope. They always live in couples. If you see one the other one has to be around. 

 Bushbok

 Baby impala covered with flies

If you move further you leave the forest area and it will change into a dry flat area with at the side mountains and baobab trees. 

Also called (upside down tree) because it looks like the roots are in the air.

Baobab tree

 Beautiful nest of weaver birds

On the savanne area you will find, wildebeast (gnoes), buffelo's zebra's and giraffes. This I will show you in my next blog so it........... will be continued.

Arusha continues

The walk went to a small waterfall surrounded with trees with enourmous roots. An amazing sight. 

In the afternoon we also made a great canoe excursion over one of the alkaline lakes. Heavy wind and it was hard to keep the camera dry while peddeling. But is was great. We saw more giraffes at the side of the lake and waterboks. Even a flamingo.

Waterboks 

Later in the afternoon while we were driving.... in the far distance the air and water coloured pink of the flamingo's. 

While we were driving towards the craterpoint we were lucky to see the very shy long haired black and white monkeys in the darkness of the trees.

That was a great day in Arusha national park.

Where the journey begins...

This journey starts in Tanzania. Tanzania home of the Kilimanjaro Mountain, the Maasai people and the most beautiful nature and wildlife in the many beautiful wildlife parks.

We started at the Arusha national Park. In this park there are no elephants and not many 'big cats' so this is one of the reasons why they have guided walks in between the animals.
The park is not very big (137 km2) but has a great landscape, the beautiful  mountain Meru, mountainforest and even a crater. You can also find swamps and alkaline Momela-lakes. When you enter the park you drive through a beautiful forest covered with moss. Black and white (long haired) Colobus Monkey's are hiding in the trees. There even is a small place they call little Seregeti. A flat area surrounded by forest. A great vieuw.

The crater area

We had a guided walk for 1,5 hour through giraffes, zebra's and buffelo's. Finally a woman. You don't see dat very often in Africa. It was really amazing I had never been so close to giraffes before. No car in between only the camera. The giraffes were very curious and not so afraid. Even some small baby giraffes where there. A great sight when you see them run away. If it is in slowmotion. I never have seen anything more beautiful then that. But there are buffelo's. One of the most dangereous animals of Africa because the attack without warning. So we kept them on a distance and did not disturb them. The lady was wearing a gun... just in case uhummm.

Walking between the giraffes... an amazing experience

Curious faces watching us

Buffelo's from a distance

 Only 15m away 

Only 10m away

Running away in slowmotion