Tarangire Park

We stayed overnight at Lake Burunge Tented Camp across the lake from Tarangire National Park. The lodge is in a village wildlife management area, part of our lodging fees support the village. Raymond gave us some more information about Tanzania. Eighty percent of the people are engaged in agriculture, but as of last year, tourism became the largest industry. There are 15 National Parks and 20 game reserves (for hunting) covering 15% of the country.

Today was elephant day. We saw them tearing down an acacia tree, drinking from holes next to the stream (because the stream was too shallow) and wallowing in the mud. We saw the damage they do to Baobab trees, shredding the tree to get moisture during the dry season. Elephants eat 150-180 kg. per day.

We also saw smaller mammals - a bat-eared fox digging for termites, hyrax feeding in the trees, banded mongoose and a lionness wandering the river banks. For birds the hit of the day was the Martial Eagle, the largest eagle in Africa. This one had killed a Dik-Dik and was eating it under a tree. We also saw Yellow Collared Lovebirds, Yellow Necked Spurfowl, White-Bellied Bustard, a Lilac Breasted Roller, Ruppell's Vulture and an African Orange Bellied Parrot.

Lilac Breasted Roller

Richard had us walk through the Sunday market and we tried some roast lamb. In the evening we took a hike to the lake and encountered fisherman hauling in their nets. We helped them with nets and caught about 30 fish.