Serengeti: Trip III

Best sighting of the trip

With tourism down to unprecedented levels, the opportunity to experience Serengeti without the usual crowds was something we could not pass up. Our previous trips (Trip I, Trip II) were both phenomenal and I hold the Serengeti National Park on a pedestal far above any other national park I've visited in Africa. The density of wildlife is unparalleled. The only drawback, which is becoming a more frequent complaint, is that the park is overcrowded. Many people are surprised when they come on safari and see 10 other safari vehicles around a pride of lions. It can be a little annoying to have to overhear the conversations of the occupants in the other vehicles or jockey for position to get a good viewing. This can reduce the intimacy of the experience but it also helps to have so many eyes out browsing the landscape; information about sightings are communicated quickly through guides so locating rare animals become easier.

Ana and I had discussed the possibility of trying to visit the Serengeti without tourists and when my friend mentioned an amazing offer that one of the lodges was having, we literally booked our trip within 24 hours of receiving the information. It seemed like a truly once in a lifetime experience.

And sure enough, the trip lived up to every expectation and was a special experience. We arrived at the gate and it was stunning to see it empty. Typically you see up to 50 safari vehicles waiting in line. As we finished checking in we saw a touristy-yet-resident looking guy was checking out and I thought to myself, "hm, maybe there will be more people here than I expected...". We saw a caravan of five vehicles exiting the park shortly after we entered and I tried to taper my expectations regarding the relative emptiness of the park. Little did i know, those vehicles I saw within the first 10 minutes of arriving would be more than I'd see throughout our three nights in the park!

We only saw two other vehicles with tourists and none were at sightings of wildlife. Every single pride of lions that we saw (4 or 5 groups) we had to ourselves, including ones with kills. We were lucky enough to see the wildebeest migration in full force with no one else in sight. Three cheetahs on the road going to a wetlands to drink? Only us to watch them. It was kind of like low season in Ruaha only with 5x the density of wildlife.

Having the park to yourself doesn't just add intimacy to sightings but it also creates a kind of feeling of adventure. We had a map and relied on the ecology of the area (grasslands, rivers, etc) to identify our daily plans. We had some great drives and some long uneventful grass filled drives. Because tourism numbers have been way down since the rainy season many of the roads in the grasslands were very difficult to follow and all the smaller roads felt like no one had passed in weeks.

We were on the fence about this trip for a while and in the end I can't believe we even hesitated. The Serengeti will likely never have as few people and even when we came out on Saturday morning we began to see many more cars coming in, likely weekend trips from Arusha. Working in the field of conservation has certainly spoiled me rotten and this trip might have just put it over the top.