Although we were flown to the Masai Mara, our trusty guides drove to meet us the next morning. Now, as we said earlier, most game drives produced a specific thrill along with the wonderful assortment of animal species. This drive produced LIONS! Actually an entire pride of them including cubs. These pictures are on a separate page on this site.
The pair of Grey Crowned Cranes posed rather nicely. There is a Crowned Plover to their right. This was our first good look at Hippos and they were in a big water hole in a river bed. Later we were to find hippos in moving river and the surroundings seemed much nicer. The Topi got to be pretty common as we traveled around the Mara. We got a taste of the herds we would see with the Wilebeeste and the Zebra. The little Gazelle is a Thompson’s Gazelle – also called “cheetah food”.
The first impression we had of the Masai Mara was that of very tall grass. There is a truck in the distance in that photo and it is almost covered by the grasses. The graze value must be enormous. We also watched a grass fire for two days but nobody seemed concerned and it eventually burned itself out. The center photo is of a Banded Mongoose. The last two photos are of Yellow-billed Storks.
