Wednesday, December 30, 2009

Where animal crackers come from!












Safari. Amazing.
It was exhilirating to see antelops and lions and elephants and hippos and pelicans in the wild, doing their own thing; far different from animals in the zoo.
Seeing lions is the huge thing when one is safari-ing. We got to see lions all 3 days we were at Parc Pendjari. The second day was frightening. Now is mating season so the males are aggressive to intruders. We came across a male and a female and he was angry. He (lightly) attacked the car in front of us, and charged our van as we drove by. We got to hear a lion growl in the bush as we sat and watched him for a few minutes--it isn't anything like you've heard, not even like lions in the zoo. They're growl fills the air so completely that it seems the growl is coming from all around you, not a single, fixed point. And yes, they are amazingly cat-like.
Elephants and antelope were everywhere--they're common place. So common place that by the 20 billionth time seeing them we didn't want the driver to stop to watch them.
The lake of hippos was so neat--they're so loud! They make sounds that can only be compared to the Devil's laughter.
And of course, the sunsets were absolutely beautiful. I manage to get a good sunset shot--my first time ever and it's of an African sunset!!
I took tons of pictures but these are my best 5 (according to me). I will put more up if you demand them :)

3 comments:

satin said...

unThese pics you took are absolutely amazing!!! I am soooo jealous you got to go! I might have to make a last minute trip at the end of this month. Glad you had an awesome time, and I loved your descriptions of what you saw. Beautiful sunset pic!!

The Anglophile said...

Beautiful shots Clay! This is me officially demanding to see more! What an amazing adventure.

D. Lyons said...

Absolutely breath taking sunset! Great pictures with commentary, would like to see more.