On Safari with Magic Honest

There are several national parks in the vast expanse of northern Tanzania between Mount Kilimanjaro and Lake Victoria. From east to west, the largest parks include Lake Manyara, Ngorongoro Crater, Olduvai Gorge, and Serengeti National Park. Each park is different in its own way, but all of them are famous for their wildlife. The two of us set out on a five day excursion through each of them to see what we could see.

We should explain that we inadvertently paid about three times as much for the trip as was necessary. We wanted to book the safari over the Internet before we even arrived in Africa. What we didn’t realize at the time, though, was that the vast majority of safaris are coordinated on the streets of Arusha. Some of the other volunteers went on similar safaris that they booked in Arusha, for instance, for significantly less cost. The most notable differences we could discern between our itinerary and theirs were that we would have our own vehicle and guide, our own plush camping accommodations, and we were scheduled to fly out of the Serengeti instead of making the 8 hour return trip on the ground. Needless to say, we had high hopes for a good journey.

Our guide picked us up in Arusha. We hoped to make a good first impression because he would be our safari guide for the next five days. He spoke heavily-accented-but-very-good English, and his name was “Honest,” which were both good things. We tried to use as much of our Swahili vocabulary as we could, which was a pleasant surprise for Honest. We hit it off immediately.

Lake Manyara
The first stop on our safari was at Lake Manyara. The lake is a huge soda lake, just about the size of New York Harbor, but only 8 feet deep. Though the park boasts a large variety of wildlife, it’s known primarily for the birds that love the shallow lake.

We ran into a problem at the gate. The park only takes credit cards from travelers, and we wanted to use cash. After a really ridiculous conversation between Rob, Honest, and the park ranger, we were finally able to use cash. When Emily pulled out Tanzanian cash, the park ranger refused it saying, “We only accept US dollars!” After much discussion, Honest was able to smooth it over and we got in by paying the Tanzanian park in Tanzanian shillings. Imagine that. We thanked Honest for “working his magic” to get us in the park on our terms and we were very excited to get started.

It felt like a little like we were entering into Jurassic Park, in no small part thanks to the giant elephants rummaging through the brush next to the road inside the gate. We traveled through the forest and passed monkeys, baboons, impala, and all sorts of other critters along the way. By far, the highlight of the lake was the pool of hippos.

On the way to the pool Rob asked Honest what the chances were of seeing an African Fish Eagle (Rob’s favorite bird in Africa). Honest began his reply with a deep, “Wellllll uhhhhhh,” which he would do every time he spoke. “If nature provides” he said. “At the end of the day we will know.”

By the time we got to the hippo pool, Rob had forgotten about the fish eagle. The pool was so teeming with storks and pelicans and geese and cormorants that it was hard to take it all in at once. In the distance were herds of buffalo and zebra, simmering on the horizon, and another herd of giraffe off in the opposite direction. We didn’t even notice the hippos until one climbed out of the water, we thought they were brown patches of mud in the water! Even Honest had never seen so many birds in the pool at once.
In the loud frenzy of squawking from the birds and guttural noises from the hippos, Honest told Rob to take a look in the thorny acacia tree about 200 yards from the pool. There it was, an African fish eagle.

We were thrilled by our four hours at Lake Manyara and thanked Honest again for “working his magic” to get us in and also for the fish eagle. By the time we left the park, Emily had nicknamed our guide, “Magic Honest.”

To top off a perfect first day on safari, we spent the night at Gibbs Farm. The ranch hotel upgraded us to a honeymoon suite which was a private villa overlooking the garden. Our escorts showed us the house and the two of us happily laughed that we accidentally booked of a five-star safari.


Ngorongoro Crater
We began the next day’s journey just after breakfast. We were both eager to get up to Ngorongoro Crater, the 8th wonder of the natural world. During the two hour drive to the crater, Emily asked Honest, “Are we going to see any lions?”

“Wellllll uhhhhhh,” he began, “It’s possible, but the Serengeti is famous for lions. Maybe we will see them . . . if nature will provide. At the end of the day we will know.”

Ngorongoro Crater is incredible. The crater itself is the collapsed summit cone of a 9,000ft volcano. The crater floor is 20 miles across and the rim is 2,000 feet high all around. There is a shallow soda lake on the western side of the crater, and the rest is mostly grassy plains that are crisscrossed with creeks, swamps, and watering holes. The whole place is absolutely alive with wildebeest, zebra, elephants, buffalo, warthogs, and everything in between (except giraffes, which can’t negotiate the crater slopes). Don’t forget the birds, too. Ngorongoro had everything from crowned cranes to firefinches and goofy looking secretary birds. We even saw two ostriches mating, which was really awkward.

True to his new nickname, Magic Honest found us some lions. About 200 yards from the road was a pride of lions sleeping in the grass. While we were watching them, the lionesses got up and began moving towards a herd of zebra, apparently to teach their cubs how to kill. Their pursuit was so slow in developing that before long other safari-goers had taken notice and were crowding around the lions, effectively ruining the hunt. Still, we were thrilled to see the lions. Emily thanked Honest for working his magic and then threw in another request, “Next, can we see them killing something?”
We continued driving around the park and were very fortunate to see a black rhinoceros. The black rhino is extremely endangered, with fewer than 50 left on the planet, and only 20 in the park. Supposedly it’s good luck if you’re able to spot one.

The highlight of the day came at the end of the afternoon. We had decided that we’d seen more spectacular birds and animals than we thought we would, and were satisfied with an amazing trip through Ngorongoro. On the way out of the crater, Rob and Honest noticed a lion in the grass about 150 yards from the trail stalking a herd of unsuspecting wildebeest. The other lions were another hundred yards away, laying in ambush. Honest stopped the truck and we watched – there wasn’t another soul in sight.

The lion crept within 20 yards of the wildebeest and then exploded out of the grass! In four lightning-quick strides, the lion was in front of its target and lunged in for the kill. It sank its jaws around the wildebeest’s neck and pierced its claws into the prey’s shoulders. Another lion came sprinting over from under a tree and jumped on the wildebeest’s back. In seconds they wrestled it to the ground and it was over.
We were absolutely stunned and Honest was just as excited as we were! He said that in his 10 years of experience as a safari guide, he’s only seen something like that happen twice. Rob said it was the coolest thing he’s ever seen. After that moment it was undeniable…Honest was magic!

Olduvai Gorge
After our amazing day at Ngorongoro Crater, we spent the night at a ridiculously nice campsite on an outcrop of rocks near Olduvai Gorge (named for the indigenous oldupai cacti-grass that grows there). It was a hard-stand tent with a king-sized bed, a flushing toilet, and a hot shower. The tent opened up to a sweeping view of the Ngorongoro highlands and the three course dinner was superb.

Our third day on safari began at Olduvai Gorge, where we stopped to see a small museum dedicated to the discoveries of Louis and Mary Leakey. The married couple from England spent 60 years doing research in the gorge, uncovering bones, stone tools, and even footprints of the first hominids some 3.6 million years ago. The gorge isn’t really much to look at. We wouldn’t even consider it a gorge, but because the valley cuts through the base of an almost regularly erupting volcano, it has become an amazingly rich repository of humankind’s earliest fossil records. Peering into the gorge invokes a deep sense of humility. On Kilimanjaro we felt small in space. At Olduvai we felt small in time.

The Serengeti
From Olduvai Gorge we traveled for an hour on a straight road through a sea of brown grass until we came to a huge gate in the middle of nowhere that announced the beginning of the park. “Serengeti” translates from Maasai to mean “endless plain,” and rightfully so. Beyond the gate were miles and miles of more of the same endless emptiness. After traveling a few times over the horizon, we came to an outcrop of rocks with a visitor’s center. We did a pit-stop there and climbed to the top of the rocks, just to verify that the endless plain was indeed endless. It was.

As we ventured deeper and deeper into the park the landscape began to change. We came to see that though the plains dominate, there are areas with trees, creeks, and swamps. The most conspicuous features on the landscape were the “kopjes” (pronounced ‘copies’). These random jumbles of rock coming out of the plain are favorite nesting spots for birds, apartment complexes for hyraxes, and perches for predatory cats. As we soon discovered, the landscape is surprisingly just as diverse as the wildlife.
The highlight of the first afternoon in the Serengeti was that we found a group of bachelor lions resting under a tree. The strongest of the group got up and sauntered over to a lioness in the grass, and presumably was trying to ask her to marry him. She teased him for hours, rubbing up against him like a giant housecat and then keeping just out of reach of his playful (although obviously frustrated) chase. We didn’t stay long enough to find out her eventual answer.
The next day was amazing. Before we got started, Emily wanted to put Honest’s “magic” to the test, so she asked to see a cheetah today. Honest insisted that he had no control whether or not “nature will provide.” He reassured us that “at the end of the day we will know.” It just so happened that before 9:00 that morning, we saw a pair of cheetahs about 200 yards from the road. We followed them for a few hours as they crept up on a herd of gazelle. Though we didn’t see an all out sprint, the cheetahs caught a baby gazelle and toyed with it, letting the poor thing run and then chasing it down again. It was fun to watch nature in action. Again we hailed “Magic Honest.”
For us the day was a success even before we stopped for a picnic lunch. We challenged Honest with another request. “What about a crocodile?” we asked. “Welllll uhhhhhh,” he said, “let’s see if nature will provide.” Within minutes he drove us to the banks of a riverbed and, sure enough, there was a crocodile.

Next, we asked to see a leopard, which was rare because they’re nocturnal hunters. The only chance to see one was if it decided to sleep in a tree near enough to the trail. It took a while, but Magic Honest managed to find a leopard in a tree. We were astounded at our luck, or Honest’s “magic,” or some combination of the two!
Emily challenged Honest with another request. “I really want to see something eating a carcass,” she said. Honest shrugged his shoulders. We puttered around the plains for another few hours. We passed by a kopje and two lions, a male and female, stood up in the grass about 10 yards from the road. It was a surprise to all three of us. They looked at the truck, then mated, and then lay back down in the grass and disappeared. We laughed and told Honest that such timing was ridiculous! He laughed too. Another 20 minutes from there we came across a pride of red-faced lions in the grass, gnawing away at zebra carcass! Way to go Honest!

At that point we’d seen more than we could’ve imagined. We had only seen one hyena from a distance, so Rob asked Honest if we could see a hyena up close. Emily upped the ante and told Honest that she wanted to see “something giving birth.”
After another hour in the truck we drove past a swamp. An extremely pregnant hyena came up out of the reeds. It walked towards us and then pooped right next to the road! It wasn’t exactly what we asked for, but close enough! Way to go Magic Honest!

We spent the last night back at the luxurious tented camp. Amidst the flushing toilet and fine dining, we could still hear the lions and hyenas howling and growling in the distance. Good thing we had a safety whistle next to the bed.

On our last morning we woke up early to visit the hippo pond. We arrived in time to see the end of the hippos’ commute from the woods after a long night of gluttony. With loud moans and bellows, the hippos jockeyed angrily for comfortable positions in the pond, where they’d spend the day napping. Rob saw another fish eagle across the pond. As the eagle flew off down the river, a 13 foot-long crocodile leapt up out of the water to try and snatch it out of the air. Unbelievable!
The two of us spent the last day on safari trying to soak in the landscape and dodge the thunderstorms that were bringing in the new rainy season. Honest found us another sleepy leopard. We also happened across a few lionesses relaxing in the shade, sleepily digesting a big meal. There’s something hypnotic about the big cats and we spent quite some time admiring their awesomeness.
In the late afternoon, Honest dropped us off at Seronera airfield. We gave Honest our field guide and included a nice tip inside to thank him for his “magic.” As we taxied off down the dirt strip we looked back to the truck. Jumping up and down and waving the book over his head was a happy and “Magic Honest.”