Christmas with Moses

'Everyone calls me Blackie' said our enormous guide and driver, 'and his name is Moses' pointing to our cook. Thus began the six-day portion of our Tanzanian portion of our East African safari overlapping the Christmas holiday.

The people and the environment have been a memorable part of our safari. We spend between 4-8 hours on the road everyday driving around or between tourist attractions. 'Road' is a strong word. If we are lucky enough to be on one of the major highways, it is comparable to mild 4-wheel driving. Mostly we are on back roads which is a jaw-jostling, hang on tight, why didn't I bring a sports bra? experience. The land is beautifully green with rolling hills in some areas and barren desert with dottings of acacia trees in others. Raw poverty abounds. Towns consisted of corrugated metal shacks, roughly made scrap-wood stalls, and rotting trash. No exceptions. Whether the people are wearing gorgeous, colorful fabrics or filthy clothes remnants, they are usually smiling. The smiles grow especially large when our vehicle stops somewhere. The van is quickly surrounded by people selling wood carvings, masks, beaded jewelry, bananas, or cloths. Many kids will simply beg. Who has given these children so many pens? From Samburu to Serengeti they motion and ask for pens.

In Tanzania, we have visited the Serengiti National Park, the impressive Ngorongoron Crater, Tarangire National Park and Lake Manyara. In addition to the animals that we saw in Kenya, we followed huge clans of baboons, a serval cat, an African spitting snake (I rolled up the window), a leopard turtle, and finally, to round out our 'Big Five,' we saw a leopard. Actually, we were lucky enough to see the leopard lounging in a bottom branch of a tree, spot a lion, and climb further up into the tree out of harm's way. The lion also jumped up into to the tree to snatch the leopard's antelope 'kill' which he had stored at the crux of a low branch. Fascinating.

We woke up Christmas morning at our poolside accomodation, surrounded by palm trees. (Okay, we were just camping in a rundown resort and the pool was empty.) However, my dad and Jim managed to keep one holiday tradition alive-- visions of sugarplums were hanging from the internal tent pole. (At the Gottbrath house, Santa always leaves candy parcels hanging over our beds just like the picture in our 'Twas the Night Before Christmas' book.)

Merry Christmas everyone!

Tera and Jim