Collected Moments of Survival

Sunset in Ndutu Where in the world is Ndutu?  - click on this link to find out where. The first in what will be a series of posts with travel advice which I hope that my readers will find a font of information that will help to make travel to the world’s destinations just a little easier and more comfortable.  Why go to Ndutu at all? Ndutu is probably the most southern tip of the Great Wildebeest Migration and it is where the Wildebeest will come to calve every year. It also lies between the Ngorongoro Crater and the Serengeti.  I can wax lyrical for many a day on the magic of the Serengeti and how it should really be on everyone’s bucket list. It is truly one of Africa’s remaining wildernesses where animals roam completely free. There are no fences to hem the animals in and they are left free to be the wild animals of Africa as they should be. To get to Ndutu By air you would have to fly via Nairobi, then transfer to Kilimanjaro International Airport....

There is nothing quite like the first time. The first time for anything seems to occupy its own little domain in the brain almost as if an extraordinary place is created within your head. And so it was with my first time for a cheetah kill. The cheetah in the distance. Tanzania’s Ndutu plains do not have a replica anywhere in the world. The vastness is difficult to describe. It is a flat, open space that appears to have no end. There are no hills or trees from horizon to horizon.  This is not a place for the fainthearted or the foolish. Fortunately I am in a safari vehicle driven by a local Tanzanian who needs no directional instruction. She ignores our vehicle as she scans the horizon. The sun has just emerged from its slumber and the honey gold glow is gently spreading over the plains. Uncannily my guide spots some movement far off in the distance and he deftly manoeuvres the safari vehicle over the scrubby bush. The progress over uncharted scrubland is both exciting...

October in the Kalahari is hot. Not just mildly hot, it is scorching. As such tents and other accommodation without air conditioning are stifling by midday. The only option is to find a spot in some sort of shade, make sure the little bit of air movement can catch you and then sit still. My plan is to wet my kikoi (a wonderful piece of cloth bought in Zimbabwe some years ago), take a bottle of water that I have frozen in my equally wonderful Engel fridge, place the bottle on my lap, throw the wet kikoi over my head and wait for the heat of the midday sun to pass.  Yellow Mongoose and Cape Cobra The Mongoose stays just out of reach of the Cobra Sometimes, through some divine intervention, I manage to nod off and the time passes quickly. Today I am rudely awakened not only by the strident screeching of some starlings but by some urgent words. “If you want some shots you better get up fast”. The kikoi gets thrown to one side and without thinking I grab my camera. And then ...