Lions & lifers

Our overnight stop at Kisolanza, situated about 50km from Iringa, was great. Not only were the showers hot, but we could buy T-bones for our braai that evening. Uli & Anka have been on the go for a month already and still have not opened their deep freeze, at this rate we will return with a fridge full of food.
We stopped at the Isimila Gorge which has been eroded over the millennia into pinnacles 10m high. It would have been wonderful to visit late in the afternoon when the sun turns everything to golds and red.

We picked up some fresh fruit & veg at the Iringa market, which by African standards was surprisingly clean and well ordered. Another thing that stood out for us was that we were not hassled as is so often the case, making it really pleasant. We took the aptly named Never Ending Road, named I think more for the never ending horrendous corrugations rather than the length of the road, to Ruaha National Park, our first Tanzanian park. Ruaha, pronounced Rua-ha-ha, is twice the size of Kruger and only receives about 2500 visitors per annum, possibly the US$ 140/day fee has something to do with it. But for us, it was fantastic being the only people camping on the banks of the Great Ruaha river. By the time our T-bone’s were braaied we had logged 11 lifers, it felt like the first time we visited Hwange (Dean will remember). For the non birders, lifers are when you see the bird for the first time. As this is the dry season the game is concentrated along the river and we quickly added 5 new mammals to the bulging bird list. Anka made us rice pudding which we enjoyed in the shade of the Anaboom trees, while we watched crocs & hippos sunning themselves on the sandbanks. We had two excellent sightings of lion, 21 in total before we had to head back to civilization.