The savage and serene in Serengeti

Published Feb 18, 2015

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Like prisoners of war from a defeated army, their heads are down, their feet drag in the dust and an air of tired resignation hangs over them as they plod across the plain in an almost endless single file.

The wildebeest of the Serengeti have been battered by the bloody campaign of life on the African savannah – a battle which has left the bones of tens of thousands behind. This seemingly endless line is the tail end of the movement of up to two million animals trekking southwards, following the rains and the grass.

Each year, so our guide, Ayoub Lazier (from Asilia Africa) tells us, about 400 000 calves are born on the 10-month migration; only about half of them make it to adulthood.

These wildebeest are heading towards the area around the Ngorongoro Crater reserve, where the end-of-year rains have seen grass explode into growth. The middle of February marks the start of the three-week calving season – with as many as 3 000 young being born a day.

From the end of March, the mega herds (which include tens of thousands of zebra and Thomson’s gazelle) start winding their way north again, culminating in about July in the carnage at the Grumeti and Mara rivers, where tens of thousands of wildebeest drown or are taken by huge crocodiles as the tidal wave of wildebeest sweeps on and over into the Maasai Mara reserve in Kenya.

Ayoub remarks that the zebra take advantage of the single-minded dimness of the wildebeest: they lead the mega herds right up to the river – and then allow the wildebeest to cross first.

The sacrificial wildebeest show the dangerous routes and go down to drowning and crocodiles. Once the zebra are satisfied their companions have borne the brunt of the tragedy, they will cross.

There is a price to friendship, even on the savannah...

And, just a few months later, the cycle begins again.

It truly is one of the wonders of nature and, although we have caught the last of the splintered herds, it is humbling to witness the primeval urges that drive the animals into, over and around certain death.

The Serengeti, all 15 000km² of it, is a tough neighbourhood. Its rolling plains belie this savage undertone – kill or be killed, eat or be eaten never had as much resonance as here.

The good rains in December and January have left knee-high grass, green and gold, right across the central and eastern Serengeti. In large parts of this area, the soil is too shallow to support the roots of trees, so for kilometre after kilometre after kilometre, the sea of grass expands to the horizon. Occasional granite koppies stand out like islands in a vast ocean.

I have been in some wide-open, middle-of-nowhere places before, but there is nothing quite like the Serengeti for making you realise how insignificant human beings can be. Its name comes from the Maasai word siringit, meaning “endless plains”. Appropriate.

That immense space is all around us at Asilia’s Namiri Plains camp – a tented luxury camp in a part of the Serengeti that has only recently been opened up to safari operators. There are no other camps nearby.

As I take a bucket shower (just 20 litres of water warmed up at the camp kitchen), I glance behind and see a bright full moon climbing into the night sky. In the opposite direction, flashing lightning illuminates distant thunderheads. As I dress for dinner I think: what a special place.

My reverie is soon broken by the arrival of a camp staff member – armed with a torch (only) – who informs me, in the sing-song way some Tanzanians have, that we must be “very educated” because he has seen a lion prowling around the adjacent tent.

We make a big detour around the other tent and take a circuitous route back to the main dining tent and fire. Our torches flash here and there over the bushes and waving grass. I suddenly feel vulnerable, but then very much alive as we reach the security of the light and the flames of the fire.

After dinner, we’re escorted back by a berobed Maasai warrior carrying a spear. You know he knows how to use it.

As I reach my tent, I hear (and almost feel) the low-pitched bellowing of a lion communicating with the others in its pride.

It’s a reminder that the Serengeti is no petting zoo.

The sense of authenticity, of being on an “old school” safari is something that characterises the Asilia camps we visit in Tanzania. “Asilia” is a Swahili word that means honest and genuine – and that’s a good way to describe the safari experience.

Asilia’s Sayari camp is altogether more upmarket (it has a pool and glass in the windows of the tented units, as well as huge baths) and the place of choice for the glitterati, when they get close to the wildebeest migration (Leonardo Di Caprio is one of them… interesting to think we’ve both swum in the rock pool and been on the early morning drives.)

Sayari is a stone’s throw from the Mara and Grumeti crossings and the sightings around July and August are hectically horrific as the crocs and assorted other predators spring their ambushes on the wildebeest tide.

None of the Asilia tented camps has air conditioning and all are constructed and run to leave the lowest possible ecological footprint. Solar power is prominent and a strict recycling regime is enforced.

The company also has a strong commitment to the communities in which it operates and is involved in a number of charity undertakings, while it has a reputation as a good employer. That’s evident in the warmth of the staff and the enthusiasm with which they do their jobs. No kidding. Your chances of a once-in-a-lifetime safari being spoilt by a grumpy staffer are vanishingly remote at Asilia.

The Serengeti camps are the perfect base from which to sally forth and sample one of Africa’s great wilderness areas.

Namiri, says camp manager Eipmark Mwakalinga, stands for “Place of the Cats” and it’s not long before it lives up to its name. We see beautiful, swift yet deadly cheetah on a number of occasions. A flash in the distance is interpreted by Ayoub as a cheetah chasing down a Thomson’s gazelle (which is similar to a springbok). As we near the place, we see that he is correct. The cat, though, is not having any of us near her kill, so she drags it off further into the grass, dropping it behind a clump of grass and collapsing down beside it.

Ayoubs explains that hiding the victim is necessary because vultures patrol overhead and their legendary eyesight means they can pick up carcasses from kilometres away.

Once they descend, hyenas will be sure to follow and any hope that the comparatively slender cheetah has of hanging on to the kill will disappear.

That’s probably why we see a female cheetah and her three cubs tucking into another recently killed gazelle at another sighting. They eat quickly and the mother frequently pops her head up to scout for unwelcome company.

Even the lions (and we see three groups on separate occasions at Namiri and Sayari) are careful to guard their kills against the scavengers.

And, as we discover when we see two male lions with a dead warthog, lion will even chase away their own family – as happens when the dominant male claims the lion’s share (what else?) of the pig, leaving the other lion to get the scraps.

Unlike parts of Kruger, it is difficult in the Serengeti, especially in the rocky and more wooded parts, to see leopard.

Although there are about 1 000 in the reserve, you will not see them if they don’t want to be seen.

Or if you don’t have a guide like Ayoub. He tells us that patience, the correct approach and understanding of the cat’s behaviour will have rewards. So, after other less careful safari vehicles chase away a leopard from a brief sighting, Ayoub cautiously waits. He predicts that the cat will head for the rocks or a tree because that is where it will get a breeze of relief from the heat of the day.

Sure enough, as we drive, Ayoub spots the cat on the side of a rocky outcrop. Our untrained city eyes can’t pick it up and, even with binoculars, it is not easy. After a short spell, the leopard slinks off around the corner into more shade. This time it is impossible to see without the binoculars. When I try, I have to be given repeated instructions from the others before I see vague parts of the cat swimming in and out of focus in the dappled shade of the midday sun.

It’s not the best leopard sighting I have had – not by a long way. But it is one of the most satisfying because we have had to work so hard for it…

Everything does come to those who wait and, in the Serengeti, life is literally Disney’s clichéd circle.

The world turns and the wildebeest move on…

Brendan Seery, Saturday Star

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