Well, what can I say ! Another amazing trip Alex. Wonderful people and hospitality and the most fabulous wildlife I feel privileged to be able to see in real life.
Our guide, Clement, in Amboseli, lovely, charming man, very knowledgeable and went out of his way to try and get us a good position for the perfect photos.
Serena Lodge didn’t allocate us a view of the plains but it only needed a request to make that happen and it was done, no problems at all. We think the staff may have been fascinated by our name, ‘Luck’ ! As they just kept saying ‘Luck’ to us, haha!
Governors Camp (NOTE: this is in the Masai Mara) gave us the river view, as we requested but on arrival I decided a tent overlooking the savannah would probably be better. I asked if this was possible and they were very accommodating and said, ‘of course’ but would have to be on the second night. They seemed a bit concerned that they only had tent 37 available, right up the end, kind of on it’s own, but I swear this is the best tent in the camp ! Not a sound from the other guests, no one walking past and was able to sit outside watching the giraffe and zebra during the day. We were on our hands and knees at 3am peering though a gap in the tent door at this hippo munching the grass only 8 feet away! Fabulous memories. Lions bellowing all night, hippos and hyena making a racket too……love it 🙂
So, the balloon flight. it was a amazing and thank god we did it as we wouldn’t have seen the Big 5 if we hadn’t. It was Little Governors side of the river where the rhinos were. I managed to snap a quick shot from the balloon of two but they were very far away. I made it quite known to the guides how desperate Gary and I were to see at least one, they asked to see my photo, they knew exactly where it was and took us there on the way back and there they were. How lucky were we to see this magnificent, endangered animal in the wild.
As for the leopard…… Dickson searched tirelessly for the leopard for us, made constant phone calls to the other guides, spoke to the Masai en-route trying to find out exactly where they had been seen then low and behold, one leopard and her cub appeared from nowhere as we flew over the canopy the other side of the river in the balloon! I was a very happy bunny 🙂 the captains of the balloons asked to see my photos as they were shocked she had a cub.
The food at Governors was really good and the staff were so lovely to us. Again, seemed fascinated with our name!
All in all, another amazing trip Alex, thank you.
Was going to attach a photo of The Big 5 for you but will only let me do two. We were so lucky to see so many other amazing animals too, even a Genet, a Serval, a Wild Cat, a Bateleur eagle, a cheetah hunt, lions matting, ostriches matting and a HUGE hippo yawn ! I took 1700 photos!
Won’t be Africa for the next few years but will certainly be in touch next time it is.
EXTRAORDINARY AFRICA 