LION PRINTS IN THE SAND

Karibu, welcome (Swahili).

This has been one of most difficult blogs to write.  Over the past 3 nights I have fiddled with it – still not happy.  I think it is because different to others this is about the people. Not easy to capture personalities, discussions and events.  An example of this is tonight’s camp fire discussion listening to a Zimbabwian, now camp manager (ex game hunter now  game photo shooter) talking to a south African driller (ex game hunter), debate the merits of organised hunting in preventing the wholesale slaughter of wild life by poachers largely supplying a Chinese market with things like rhino horn or ivory or lion bones (now a substitute for tiger bones as an aphrodisiac).  The one thing in common between the two is their incredible passion for the country and the despair that their wild life is under such incredible pressure.

Back to the blog proper…

The trip to camp from Dar is a 2 hrs in a light plane to the SW to a place called Songea and then 2.5hrs east by 4WD.  Nearly all the flight is over the Selous game park, a huge area, probably 250km long by 100km wide. I’m usually a pretty good light plane flyer and believe me I have flown on some really crap planes across the NT and this one by comparison looked quite good, but I had nervous South African next to me who for the whole 2.5 hours complained that the plane never seemed to level out, so at one stage he had me convinced that it was going to drop backwards out of the sky - a bit of a freaky trip…

I’m obsessed with seeing wildlife. Driving out to the main drilling site today there were some mighty big pussy cat paw prints, most likely with very big teeth and a taste for meat! And near to them are great piles of dung and flattened grass which of course are elephant.    But in terms of wild life so far I've seen a couple of wart hogs and a herd of sables and a monkey or two plus so many little pussy cat prints.  My determination is to see elephant and simba so I am going to organise a game scout and do own personal safari before I leave apparently there is a hippo hole nearby and a big waterhole elsewhere but only accessible by foot… hmmmm…. (clearly the place is full of wildlife so tell me what do I do with a young geologist who is going camp crazy and wants to go running around sunset and won’t be told?).

You run into quite a few white Africans in Tanzania, they are generally a really passionate lot who love Africa, I mean seriously love the place. Some of the more interesting ones I’ve met are people like Jason, a South African despite this a delightful fellow, a great sense of humour and an ex game hunter, still loves to shoot but has incredible sympathy for the bush. Then Jonathan a Zimbabwian, his family driven out of the country by Mugabe in his land grab and with his parents now running a beach riding resort on the Coast of Mozambique, apparently their farm was stripped of anything of value and the land is now vacant and overgrown.  Or Darren who runs the drilling company also an ex game hunter, a really nice genuine individual, Sth African, treats his guys really, really well, knows southern and east Africa so well.

Today’s photos are mainly of a recent visit by the District Commisssioner, a central government appointed official – uneventful but interesting.