We spent Christmas in Tanzania this year. Justin got his Christmas present by leaving a few days early to climb Mount Kilimanjaro. After five days of climbing the mountain and reaching the "Top of Africa," he made it back safely and met the girls and I at the airport for our arrival to Tanzania.
To begin our family trip, we had a private driver take us on a couple of safari game drives in a safari jeep where the roof lifts up for better viewing. During the first day, we were greeted with lots of baboons who were not shy around us at all - which also put us a bit on alert to make sure they weren't too aggressive around the kids as we walked around the front entrance, waiting for our driver to get our tickets to enter in to the park. Then we hopped back in to the car and began the drive. Many of the animals that we saw are also in South Africa, but they were slightly different. The giraffe, for example, had spots that were shaped more like X's than squares, and the zebras were more brown and had vertical stripes down their noses. We also saw water buffalo which we have never seen in South Africa.
During this drive, the girls were particularly excited about the zebra. We put them both on the roof top so they could get a better view; they could have stayed there all day! And for the rest of the drive, they had their eyes glued to the window, looking for more zebra. Kaelia even pointed from time to time, saying "zebra," hoping to see some.
The next day, the driver took us to the Ngorongoro Crater for another game drive. Again, we met some baboons while we waited for our driver to purchase our tickets. We all got out of the car and made the mistake of leaving the window halfway down. Instantly, a big baboon jumped in to the jeep and went straight to our lunch basket. Another driver ran over and banged on the window to shoo him out. He jumped out, but then started to charge Justin with Taelyn on his back. Justin jumped back and yelled at him, so he went over to me and Kaelia and swiped at my legs. Unfortunately, I was wearing short shorts and he scraped me a bit just behind my knee. He didn't break enough skin to do any damage, but it was definitely an adrenaline rush for a while.
It then took a couple of hours to get down to the crater, but once there, we immediately saw that this game drive would be unlike any other we have ever been on. The crater was one big open space, so instead of having to drive around little trails for hours trying to find various animals, they were all they together. To add to the list of animals that we had never seen prior to this trip, we saw a black rhino, hundreds of flamingos, and a cheetah up close! The cheetah was an awesome find; it was laying in the brush just a few meters from the side of the dirt road and then stood up for a minute just in time for the perfect picture. The other highlight happened just a little while later when we saw two lions hunting down some zebras. As lions got closer, the zebras packed up and started pawing their hooves. Apparently the lions were intimidated by the amount of zebras all bunched up together, so at the last minutes, the two breeds walked on by each other. It was incredible to see!
After the two days of safaris, we took a flight out to Zanzibar Island where we spent the rest of our vacation on a beautiful white sand beach. The girls LOVED the beach, and they loved swimming with us. We all went swimming every day and often several times a day. Both girls developed their early swimming skills fairly well between the ocean and the pools at our hotels from the game drives. Taelyn is often hesitant about going under water, but Justin got her to practice being a hippo by blowing bubbles as she put her head under water. She also scaled an entire circumference of a pool by hanging on to the side and moving all around the pool. Kaelia showed a fearless joy of the water too. She liked to jump in to the pool/ocean, waiting for one of us to catch her. Many times, she jumped in without waiting for us and went right under water. She was a champ! She held her breath under water and immediately picked herself up with a smile. She absolutely loved going under water and playing with us. Both girls also enjoyed running into and away from the waves in the ocean.
Aside from swimming, the girls also enjoyed scoping out the beach for seashells and creatures. Taelyn started collecting seashells the first day on the beach as a present to bring home to her nanny, Niki. She also kept a few for herself - especially those that reminded her of an ice cream cone. One of her ice cream cones, however, gave us all quite a surprise. After Taelyn had been playing with it for about 20 minutes, she handed it over to me and something all of sudden poked out of it. Taelyn's ice cream cone ended up being a tiny hermit crab! We also encountered several dead sea crabs on the beach that intrigued both of the girls. Taelyn enjoyed picking up "Sebastian" (from the Little Mermaid) to play with him while Kaelia was a little more reserved. She touched him from time to time, but any time we tried to get her to hold him, she threw him away.
By the end of the trip, we all felt relaxed and satisfied while the girls were a bit homesick. Taelyn started talking about how she missed her cat (a large stuffed animal that sits on her bed) and eventually got upset any time she saw something that reminded her of a cat. By the last day, she even cried when she saw a cat on Kaelia's diaper! What's funny, though, is that once we made it home, she told us that she missed the ocean.
 |
 |
| Create your own photo album |
