Taking things apart.
Learning how to jury-rig
a missing brake pad.
Douglas and his wife, Tumaini (Hope), picked Dona and me up at Kiota Guest House and we headed west and then back north to get to the area north west of Mt. Kilimanjaro. We were headed to Simba Farm. Douglas had never been there, but had directions. The directions were "Go to the end of the pavement, then 5km further." However, the road had been paved further in the time from when those instructions were gathered. So of course we went too far.
Douglas started turning the Land Cruiser around but when he went to back-and-fill we all heard a loud "clunk". He pulled to the side of the road and we soon discovered we had no brakes. We had lost a brake pad.
It wasn't long before someone came by. The first person to come by was on a boda-boda (motor-bike). He gave us instructions to the farm. The second guys were a full-fledged mechanic and a friend. The mechanic seemed to know exactly what to do, and between him and Douglas we had most of what we needed. We jacked up the car, removed the wheel, and undid the brake line. But there was one thing we needed which we didn't have — a nail. So the mechanic's friend headed to a neighboring farm and came back with a selection of small nails with smallish flat heads, more like a brad. The mechanic wrapped soft string around the shank and inserted the nail in the brake line, then put it back together, effectively plugging the line. That brake wouldn't work, but all the others still would. Douglas, the mechanic and his friend all exchanged phone numbers and we headed to the farm.
Dorobo was sending out a replacement vehicle, but it would take a few hours to get to us. In the interim, we checked out birds around the farm and took a short walk in some nearby native forest, where we found a paradise flycatcher and some sunbirds.
Much of the native forest in East Africa has been cut down and replaced with mono-cultures of commodity trees, usually non-native. This part of Tanzania was no exception. In the first image below, you can see the mono-culture forest in the background.
I can't properly identify the bird in the middle above... or the bird below either... Seems like it should be easy.
We found this neat multi-colored lizard scurrying around in the leaf-litter.
The next day we drove down onto the plain of west Kilimanjaro. We would be in the Enduimet Wildlife Management Area; we had to stop at the entrance gate and pick up a ranger to travel with us. It was a dry, brushy expanse, and unfortunately we got a late start. But we still saw some cool stuff, especially the Gerenuks!
Unfortunately, by the time we were in the brush with the Gerenuks it was pretty hot and there were heat waves rising everywhere, which made taking pictures not so good.
We had great views in all directions, but it was a bit hazy. We could see Kilimanjaro to the east, and Meru to the west. This was Sid's summit day, so we were delighted it was somewhat clear. There were clouds around the summits of both Mt. Meru and Mt. Kilimanjaro off and on all day long. We hoped Sid was in the right place and the right times to get good views on his climb.
We came upon a lone bull elephant who didn't seem to know exactly what he wanted to do. At first he was sucking water out of a puddle by the side of the road and spraying it on himself, then he was simultaneously peeing and giving himself a dust bath. For a while it looked like he was a bit upset and was going to come down and beat up on us, but then he wandered off. We also came across a few tiny groups or lone wildebeests known as the blue wildebeest, the white-bearded wildebeest and the brindled gnu. A far cry from the huge herds that were up on the Serengeti.
We didn't see a lot of birds out on the dry pans, but we did find this one raptor. I'm not sure what it was; I think an Osprey.
We climbed a small hill which looked like it had an abandoned safari camp on it, but it turned out to be a new camp under construction. Or maybe a new camp whose construction had been abandoned. In any case, we stopped to enjoy the view of the surrounding plains. We could see Lake Amboseli in Amboseli National Park in Kenya, the border with Kenya, and out onto the salt flats of the surrounding plain.
When we left the hill we tried to go back by a different route, out across the salt flats in a big loop. However, dry as they might look, with all the recent rain the salt flats quickly became a kind of gumbo and we chose discretion over getting stuck and turned around. Dang! I was looking forward to that exploration.
We stopped for lunch, then worked our way slowly back, enjoying the wildlife along the way.
Back at Simba Farm we took some short walks and enjoyed the birds.
We had a great relaxing evening and dinner with Douglas and Tumaini. The next day we would head back to Arusha where we would meet Sid after his climb; our route would take us through Arusha National Park.
