The national park I looked forward to seeing the most on my trip to Kenya was Amboseli, because of it’s location at the foot of Kilimanjaro and the large herds of elephants living there. As you can see on the picture we sadly didn’t get the greatest view of Kilimanjaro, but at least we saw the silhouette as we entered the park. The day after the mountain was completely hidden in the mist – I have to admit I was very disappointed after seeing pictures of how great the view can be on a clear day online. There is no way to control the weather though, so the best we could do was to make the best out of our time there with our without the view.
Every morning all of the elephants living in the park make it a habit to walk to the water, this makes it quite easy for tourists like us to get to see them all up close as they cross the road.
I was really impressed by just how big these animals can get. That guy with just half a tooth left was a giant – much larger than our safari van! After seeing the elephants cross the road, we found two lions a male and a female. At first glance it looked as if they were just relaxing in the sun, but after a little while it became pretty clear that was not what they were doing at all..
Apparently, lions mate for a whole week. During this time they don’t hunt or eat – they simply sleep and mate with eachother over and over again. We decied to give the lions at least a little bit of privacy (allthough several vans arrived after our guide explained the situation over his radio) and drove to a hill overlooking the park. Here we could get out of the van for a bit, stretch our legs and get a good view of the elephants once more, as they were closing in on the water.
On this gamedrive we also saw a confused hippo on land, hyenas and zebras among other things – In conclusion: the park is worth a visit in it’s own right even when you can’t see Kilimanjaro 🙂
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