We spent our day in a collapsed volcano.  Ngorongoro Crater didn’t disappoint.  It was a clear morning at our hotel but it was cold and there was still a little cloud hanging around the rim of the caldera (which is at around 10,000 ft).  We did an hour of the usual rough roads to get to the descent road into the crater.  Then we saw two of the “Big Five” species before we’d even made it to the floor of the crater.  There was a big bull elephant with enormous tusks and not too far away there was a sleeping male lion.  Before long we were seeing thousands of zebra, wildebeest, gazelles, Cape buffalo and warthogs.  There were tons of hippos.  The highlights were reckoned to be the Caracal we spied (a medium sized cat with big pointy ears… rarely seen in Ngorongoro) and the pack of hyenas ripping up a Cape Buffalo carcass.  After another great picnic lunch in the field, we went back up to the crater rim to visit a Maasai village.  We watched (and joined in) traditional dances.  We saw the men make fire and throw spears, then we got a tour of the homes within a protective brush enclosure. 

Then we had another 90 minutes of bouncing over dirt roads before we got back to the ultra comfortable Plantation Lodge for the evening. 

Best Regards

RMI Guide Dave Hahn