Having first booked the trip for travel in 2020, it was so lovely when the trip finally took place. "Emma Dunn at Yellow Zebra Safaris helped plan a very special trip for me to visit Zambia and Zimbabwe last month. Travellers benefit in turn by enjoying truly authentic cultural experiences, among the best in Tanzania! The former are mostly Maasai people, benefiting from local tourism. As a result, there is a close and often symbiotic relationship between human and wildlife communities here. The area is also notable for its location on village land rather than within a game reserve or national park that prohibits human settlement. This is one of the world’s largest collections of human footprints and well worth a visit. Descend to the shoreline however and marvel at ‘the Lake Natron footprints’, fossilised footfalls preserving moments over 120,000 years ago when two groups of Homo sapiens traversed the volcanic-ash terrain. With a magical location ‘guarding’ Lake Natron, Ol Doinyo Lengai is an extremely steep climb – but reach its peak and you are rewarded with breathtaking views over Ngorongoro, Kilimanjaro and all the volcanoes of the Rift Valley! On a clear day this view is absolutely outstanding. Surrounded by the Great Rift itself, scenery really is what this destination is all about! Activities around Lake Natron Scenery however is breath taking and with a population of lesser flamingo (approximately 2.5 million, the largest breeding colony in the world) congregating on the lake shore to feast on the blue-green algae Spirulina, you are guaranteed a spectacular sight! Other wildlife highlights include spotting the long-necked gerenuk, but neither of these matches the sheer majesty of the landscape of Natron. The area does not claim to rival the neighbouring Serengeti and Ngorongoro for wildlife numbers – big game is sparse here. The scenery is phenomenal some of the most spectacular in Africa. Approximately six hours drive from Arusha itself, this is an area well off the beaten track, consisting of a near-pristine forest reserve and extensive grass plains interspersed with mountains, rocky hills, and even a live volcano – Ol Doinyo Lengai, ‘Mountain of God’ in Maasai. “You’d literally get, say, a hundred finches washed ashore in a 50-yard stretch.The lake sits close to the Tanzania/Kenya border, in the Arusha region. I saw entire flocks of dead birds all washed ashore together, lemming-like,” he says. During dry season, Brandt discovered, when the water recedes, the birds’ desiccated, chemically-preserved carcasses wash up along the coastline. Brandt theorizes that the highly-reflective, chemical dense waters act like a glass door, fooling birds into thinking they’re flying through empty space (not long ago, a helicopter pilot tragically fell victim to the same illusion, and his crashed aircraft was rapidly corroded by the lake’s waters). A swallow © Nick Brandt 2013, Courtesy of Hasted Kraeutler Gallery, NYĪs you might expect, few creatures live in the harsh waters, which can reach 140 degrees Fahreinheit-they’re home to just a single fish species ( Alcolapia latilabris), some algae and a colony of flamingos that feeds on the algae and breeds on the shore.įrequently, though, migrating birds crash into the lake’s surface.
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