Posted from Jinja, Uganda- the source of the Nile!!!
The Masai Mara is essentially the Kenyan Serengeti- all that divides the two is an arbitrary line and a multi-hour journey via Nairobi unless you are some sort of non-human animal. Amazing stuff out there though, and here is a small fraction of what we saw-
Not one but two gigantic lion prides, and a lioness who was busy stalking her prey until the safari trucks cut in front of her (illegal but unfortunately common around here). I’ve never posted a picture of a male lion before though and this guy was so wonderfully lazy I can’t resist!
A hyena and a bunch of baboons and Maribu storks (closely related to their cousin in Europe who winter down here) checking out the food near a hotel’s compost heap. Not exactly natural, sure, but I love seeing multiple species together so here we are!
A cheetah panting in the midday sun as you surely would if YOU had to wear a winter coat in the middle of summer. Such a beautiful creature, we were so lucky to get so close and share some time together (though he spent most of the time panting like a dog…).
The Masai Mara has th most giant hippo pools I have seen in my life. You rarely see them out of the water in other parks because like us they can sunburn, but here it appears to be no issue.
This guy excited me because after this point new species are always exciting- a hyrax! This is doubly exciting actually because this rat-looking thing is actually the closest related relative to an elephant- I know, what?!- so they’re rather neat to see in order to contemplate the strangeness of evolution. After all, whatever strange beast thought to give us the elephant gave us the hyrax, and what kind of world would we be in without that?
A bona-fide zebra crossing. I really crack myself up sometimes.
Last but not least, a whole mess of Masai giraffes. We saw about 12 in this herd, two fighting each other and the rest just cruising through the underbrush with their heads sticking up like periscopes. I’d never seen anything like it and that’s the great thing about safaris, you never run out of amazing things to see!
Snapped on my first trip outside Amsterdam in the Netherlands, this is Dwingeloo Radio Observatory. Constructed in the 1950s, it has a diameter of 25 meters which at the time made it the largest radio telescope in the world. These days it’s no longer used for research and instead just by amateur radio enthusiasts, but it’s still located right by ASTRON, the headquarters for astronomy research in the Netherlands near the village of Dwingeloo.
