Times in Tanzania: Arusha National Park: Trip VI

An awesome clearing by a small stream.

Arusha National Park (ANP) remains a real treat for us as the most affordable and nearby national park (Trip I, Trip II, Trip III, Trip IV, Trip V).

The day was overcast and cloudy, we had very little sunshine that was always fleeting. We regretted not bringing more layers since we had counted on the sun coming out to warm us up. Still, we stuck to our typical plan of visiting open spaces in the morning (in this case the lakes) and then covered forest in the afternoon.

On our way to the lakes we saw a new loop that had been opened up. I am never one to decline a new route so we carefully pulled into the Rydon loop. It turned out to be a very recently cut loop through sparse grassland and although it had a few nice vistas, it was close enough to the border that you could hear human activity and the birds were either absent or quiet. Since the road (more like path) was new it was extremely bumpy and I even worried about our car bottoming out.

With the cold, overcast, bumpy road and lack of wildlife, our spirits were about as low as you will ever see for us in a national park. As we both quietly wondered how much longer the loop was, suddenly a large male elephant emerged from the side of the road. I turned off the car and it quietly crossed the road a few meters ahead of us. It was our first time seeing an elephant in ANP and we were ecstatic! Ana chided me for encouraging us to exit the car and investigate a bird we were trying to identify as we had noticed elephant dung on the road earlier. In these types of overgrown grasslands it is amazing that an elephant can sneak up on you, but they can!

We parked the car to try to climb on the roof and get a better look and then I saw another elephant about to come in the road but he was startled and jumped back into the bushes. These were the first skittish elephants we had seen in Tanzania and since they were both males with full tusks we thought this wasn't the result of poaching. Since we could literally see buildings on the border of the park we figured they are probably aggressively pursued if local residents see them coming for their crops.

I lost track of the first elephant but the second one hid in the bushes only raising his trunk like a periscope to test the air. If I had not been on the roof I would have been unable to detect the elephant at all.

We then moved on to the lakes. The landscape was particularly dry and the lakes were heavily populated by grebes and ducks. There are a network of five or so lakes and we decided to not do the typical circuit around them all but rather visit the big lake and then a smaller one. We could see the distant lakes were full of flamingos and the small lake we visited also had a ton!

After the lakes we went up to the forest where the trail to summit Mt. Meru begins. It is a massive climb on the way up to the forest and the montane forest is always a treat with the dense trees dripping with moss and lichen. The sun even came out for a few moments as we climbed and when we reached the viewpoint we were excited to see Mt. Kilimanjaro faintly visible in the distance.

The day was a success and we even saw some new loops that we didn't have time to take. We look forward to our next trip to the park!