The Dive Trip

After touring around New Zealand, I spent the next week in Sydney. I spent a lot of time hanging out at the beach, touring around and seeing family. I went to Taronga Zoo, and saw all requisite Australian animals, but these were limited to those who live above the surface of the water. On Thanksgiving Day, I boarded a flight to Cairns to meet up with a trip that would take care of that.

The diving expedition I went on was a unique partnership between a few different organizations. These included Mike Ball Dive Expeditions, John Rumney’s Eye-to-Eye Marine Encounters, The World Wildlife Fund, The Discovery Channel and Price Waterhouse Coopers. I was extremely fortunate to get a spot on this boat (I got the last bed). The trip took us from Cairns, on Mike Ball’s Spoilsport, Northeast towards Osprey Reef. This trip was special because it was a shark tagging and tracking expedition, pairing Mike Ball’s live aboard dive trip with shark researcher and documentary filmmaker Richard Fitzpatrick’s continuing research on the shark population at Osprey. I Osprey Reef lies 110 miles off the coast of Australia. It is a reef on top of a seamount that rises out of 9000 feet of water. Despite the fact it lies outside Australian territorial waters, as well as any national park protection, Osprey boasts a thriving marine population, including a healthy shark population.

The global shark population has been decimated in recent years by overfishing and a particularly barbaric practice known as finning, where fisherman cut off the valuable fins of a shark and through it back, alive, into the water. By not having to store the shark catch, finning boats can catch a lot more sharks, and only take the fins. As there is no current protection at Osprey, it is open for fishing. Richard Fitzpatrick estimates that the shark population at Osprey could be destroyed in two weeks. The purpose of Richards’s research at Osprey is to show how vital the reef is to the shark population and to gain protection for it from the Australian government. There is currently a proposal to vastly expand the protections for Osprey as well as much of the Coral Sea.

In addition to the crew of the Spoilsport, the passenger list included Americans, Brits, Australians, Belgians, Germans and Koreans. In addition to Richard Fitzpatrick, Jaap Barendrecht and John Rumney rounded out the research crew. Jaap has worked with Richard for a long time, and John Rumney is the former captain of the Undersea Explorer, a dive expedition boat that was the platform for much of Richard’s research at Osprey. We also had media crew from The Australian, and Channel 10 in Sydney, as well as Jonathan Larkin from the WWF and contest winners from the Discovery Channel and PWC. It was an eclectic group of varying ages and backgrounds that gelled quickly around a love of the ocean, and an appreciation of the ability to dive at Osprey Reef, which receives at most 5000 visitors a year. It is one of the last unspoilt dive spots on earth.

We cast off from the dock at about 8pm on Thanksgiving Day, and steamed overnight to the North. By morning we had reached the northern end of the Ribbon Reefs, on the Great Barrier Reef, where we had our first dives. The water was crystal clear and had a postcard quality to it. The reefs were filled with fish I was used to seeing in aquariums and tropical fish stores, but much larger and more beautiful. Emperor Angels, Clown Triggers, Naso Tangs and various species of anemone fish. I also saw my first shark underwater. It was a reef white tip, and it was swimming away from me. After making sure everyone was OK with the diving, we did another overnight steam to Osprey. It is a unique sensation, staring at a shallow reef, turquoise water, and coral just below the surface, but with no land in sight. That clarity descended all the way down, and numerous times I looked down at my depth gauge to be surprised at how deep I had gotten. As we jumped in for our first dive at this shark spot, I was a little apprehensive. As we descended, and moved past the natural amphitheatre that would be our arena for watching Richard and his unique shark capture techniques, I got my fist glimpse of a group of roughly 20 grey reef sharks. Over the next 3 days, I would go from apprehension at the presence of sharks to real comfort. On my second day at Osprey, I saw 3 scalloped hammerheads materialize out of the blue, and my first thought was, “I hope they come closer.” I even began trying to get close to reef white tips to try and get pictures.

Our third dive at Osprey was an up close demonstration of Richard’s unique shark research methods. Richard bates reef white tips, and while they are eating, he lassoes them with a tail rope. Sometimes he attached tags to them underwater, and others he brings them up to the surface to surgically implant them with sensors. These various sensors work in conjunction with data loggers placed around the reef to build a highly data rich picture of how the sharks live.

After 3 days on Osprey Reef, we began moving back south towards Cairns. We spent two days diving popular sites back on the Great Barrier Reef. One of these is the famous Cod Hole, where immense Potato Cod congregate, and interact with divers. We also stopped at a dive site called “Steve’s Bommie”. A bommie is a coral tower that rises up from the sea floor. They serve as hubs for shallow water marine life, coral reef fishes and smaller pelagic fish. Steve’s Bommie provided the widest array of marine life I’d seen the entire trip. From cleaner shrimp, to multiple species of clown fish, both pelagic and reef dwelling species were accounted for. On our night dive at Lighthouse Bommie, we came across 3 sea turtles, using the bommie as shelter. The largest one arrived as we were already descending next to the bommie, and almost ran into me. I had to push it up to make sure it didn’t hit me in the head.

Our final dive site was Flare Point which, while not nearly as rich in marine life at Steve’s Bommie, had the most picturesque water I had seen. It was also where I encountered the most aggressive animal of the trip: the Titan Trigger fish. Titan’s are the largest of the triggerfish and feed on coral. The have big teeth that look like a hamster’s. During nesting season, they dig out pits and defend them, against anyone who comes near. This includes unsuspecting divers. Many of us ended up with teeth mark in our flippers as we tried to get away. By the end of the trip, they became know as A-hole Triggers.

I got off the boat, exhausted, on Thursday morning. I will definitely be returning to dive more of the remote reefs off of Northern Queensland.

Dive Photos from Australia

Gavin's Dive Photos

New Zealand

I’m back in Sydney after three weeks of backpacking around New Zealand. I travelled New Zealand very differently to any other place I’ve been. I went with the Kiwi Experience, a company that operates a fleet of bright green busses that travel a circuit around both islands. You can hop on and hop off as much as you want, meaning a trip can last as little as a few weeks to as much as a year. I took three weeks to travel both islands, which honestly was on the short side, as compared to some other people on my bus.

After catching my flight from Sydney to Auckland, I found a shuttle to take me to my hostel. Even though it was only 30 mins long, it was quite entertaining. First there was the older kiwi couple that had parked their car near the airport when they went on holiday. Now that they had returned, they couldn’t remember which hotel they had parked their car at. We drove in circles for a bit while they argued in the back; each stating the other didn’t know what they were talking about. We finally found the car, and proceeded on into town.

I stayed in Auckland for one night before heading off on the Kiwi bus. It was rather uneventful, save for the lack of hot water in the hostel. Monday morning, I was outside ready to be picked up by the bus. The bus itself was filled with people in their early to mid 20’s. I was definitely on the older side, but not uncomfortably so. There was a core group of people who I travelled the north island with and few who crossed the ditch with me as well.

Our first day’s journey took us north to the Bay of Islands, or Paihia in Maori. It’s a large area with 144 different islands. Paihia, along Whitianga are the main cities, although there are countless other towns along the way. From Paihia, it’s a day trip up to Cape Reinga, where the Pacific Ocean and Tasman Sea meet. The lifestyle in Paihia is very ocean-oriented, and the place had a really nice, relaxed atmosphere to it. During my day in Paihia, I took a cruise out to the hole in the rock, which is a seamount/island just outside of Paihia. It has historical significance for the Maori, and has an archway large boats can pass through, weather permitting. I enjoyed the hostel in Paihia much more than the one in Auckland, and we had a nice dinner prepared by the hostel.

After walking around the next morning, we caught the bus back down to Auckland for one more night before heading south. There’s not much to say about Auckland. It’s not a bad city, but there’s nothing special about it either. Aucklanders are known by other Kiwis as JAFA’s (for Just Another F-ing Aucklander). The next morning, I jumped on the bus headed south, driven by none other than the man simply called Bods. Bods was a mine of information about all things Kiwi, and could drive a bus down a windy country road as though it was a small sports car. In addition, he was a really cool guy, who would be my bus driver all the way to Queenstown.

From Auckland we headed on to Mercury Bay, which required us to drive all the way around a large bay. Mercury bay reminded me a bit of Paihia, but much quieter. Along the way we stopped at Cathedral Cove, a beautiful beach that required a 30-minute walk to get to. The incredible thing about New Zealand, as opposed to California, is that there are huge numbers of freshwater rivers and stream that empty into the ocean. Some of them end up as small waterfalls that come down the cliffs. There were quite a few of these at Cathedral Cove.

From Mercury Bay we headed to the heart of the North Island, and the towns of Rotorua, Waitomo and Taupo. In Rotorua, some of the bus decided to jump out of a perfectly good plane. Given the amount of time I spend on planes, I like to keep the number of times I takeoff and land the same. That night for dinner, we went to a traditional Hangi, a Maori feast. Before the meal, we saw how the Maori would greet arriving guests. The Maori are a warring people, formerly cannibalistic, who were weary of visitors. They subjected visitors to an intimidating series of combative dances. Only after they had discerned the intentions of the guest would they throw leaves to the ground in front of them as a peaceful invitation.

Waitomo is home to a large subterranean river system that you can ride an inner tube through, however there’s not much else there. From Waitomo we headed on to Taupo. The Primary feature of Taupo is the lake, which is larger than Singapore. I also, completed the Tongariro crossing, which is an 18km, or roughly 11-mile hike with massive changes in elevation. I climbed and descended well over a mile vertically that day. Attached to the crossing is Mt. Ngarahue, which played the role of Mt. Doom in the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Nearby is Mt. Ruapehu, a popular mountaineering and ski spot.

From Taupo, we headed south to River Valley, a stunningly beautiful and isolated river rafting camp. Then it was on to Wellington, before crossing “The Ditch”, which is the Cook Straight between the North and South Islands. From there we began moving towards the west coast. Our first night on the South Island was spent in Nelson, the geologic center of New Zealand, and a lovely little town. It was also our introduction to the mountainous South. We visited the Nelson lakes, which are snow fed, beautiful and very very cold. Some people on the bus decided to jump in, in a dramatic fashion. I stayed dry and took the pictures. We continued down the coast, taking in scenery the whole way. Much of it reminded me of California, and other times Cape Town. It was much colder than either though.

Our next big stop was Franz Josef, home to the glacier. One of the more spectacular sights I’ve ever seen. Unfortunately I did not hike onto the glacier. The thought of an 8-hour hike on ice, in the rain was not particularly appealing to me. It’s something I want to do if I ever get back to New Zealand. I took the opportunity to move ahead a day early, so I would have more time in Queenstown. The next stop on the way down was Lake Wannaka, which is a big mountain lake. It is very easy to get accustomed to the scenery, and you forget how breathtaking it is.

While the rest of New Zealand was nothing to sniff at, Queenstown was, by far, my favorite place. The town is situated among massive mountains, formed by glacier movement over millions of years. Queenstown is busy year round. In winter it’s a ski town, and in summer it’s the adventure capital of the south. Arriving in Queenstown in the afternoon, I enjoyed the Fergburger, quite famous as the best hamburger in New Zealand, and one of the better I’ve had anywhere. The following morning, I woke up early and picked up a mountain bike. Throughout high school, I mountain biked a lot, even making a trip to Mammoth one summer to ride. It all ended abruptly when my bike was stolen. The bike I rented was far more advanced than my old one, with both front and rear suspension and disc brakes. I rode about 30 mins through town towards the Seven Mile Track, a biking and hiking area set up by the New Zealand department of conservation. I spent about 3 hours riding the tracks, which were much steeper and more technical than the ones I used to ride. I was a reintroduction by fire, but I really enjoyed it. It also made me realize how out of shape I was. After an exhilarating morning, I spent the rest of the day hanging out. I had another Fergburger. I napped. Did I mention I was out of shape?

The following morning, I got on a bus for what was the highlight of my trip to New Zealand. We drove the long way around to get to Milford Sounds. According to Bods, they’re not really sounds, but rather fjords because they were formed by glaciers. He’s the driver I guess he’s right. Milford Sounds is a bay surrounded by steep mountains, filled with waterfalls draining the water from the snowy peaks. It is truly stunning. Although we spent only a couple hours on the Sounds, the roads in and out were no less spectacular, with tall, snow capped mountains, big old evergreen trees, lakes, waterfalls and mountain streams you can drink straight out of. Douglas Adams, author of “Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy”, wrote a non-fiction book called “Last Chance To See” which I read when I was 14. In it he described New Zealand as having the type of scenery that makes you want to break into spontaneous applause. That’s an understatement.

New Zealand Pictures are up!

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Hello From New Zealand

Right now, I'm on a bus heading from Auckland to Mercury Bay. It's been quite a while since my last update, so here is a quick recap. After 2 spectacular weeks in Kenya and Tanzania, I spent a bit more than a month in London with my family, getting to see them on a day-in-day-out basis that I hadn't been able to for quite a while. On October 20, I packed up my things and headed west.

The first stop was Boston, where I hadn't been in almost 7 years. It was really great to explore a city so integral to American history. Before I left the US in September I picked up the HBO miniseries "John Adams" on DVD. It is an incredibly produced, thoroughly detailed account of his life. Much of it takes place in Boston, and after thoroughly enjoying the series, seeing the city completed the picture. My impression of Adams, Jefferson, Washington and their colleagues might be a bit naïve, but I believe they had a purity of purpose that is noticably lacking in their modern Congressional descendants. While they were by no means perfect, they aknowledged this and attempter to account for their humanity in the system they devised.

During my short trip to Boston, I visited my good friend Jamie De Coster, who is a masters student at the Fletcher school at Tufts. We met in our first Political Science Class at USC, and were good friends all through college. After college we lost touch, and were reconnected through the miracle of Facebook.

I also go the opportunity to spend some time with uncle, David Werbeloff. It was great catching up with him and his wife Marina. Our last few meeting have been under much more somber circumstances, and it was great to see them during a happier time.

After Boston it was off to New York city for a long weekend, and to attend the wedding of two friends of mine from Emory. I started graduate school with Justin and graduated with Andrea, and was the beneficiary of what must have been one of their first joint Mitzvahs right after they started dating. Their wedding was fantastic to be at and I really enjoyed being there to celebrate with them, their families, and so many of my closest friends from grad school. I met up with the Greenbergs for lunch, and got to see Melanie quite a bit as well. A final pre-expedition brunch was had with Daniel Aires, whose Southern Hemisphere expedition with his brother Jon (AKA: Puss, Dieter) in 2007/2008 was the initial inspiration for my own trip.

From New York, I headed down under through Los Angeles. I took an early flight from JFK to break up the trip, and headed into LA for some dinner and to see friends. I surprised my friend Stefanie, and got to see her, her husband Dan and her sixth month old daughter Riley. I'm officially Uncle Gavin. I had dinner with one of best high school friends, Jared Kaftel, and his wife Tovah. After a filling dinner at Jeff's, I hopped a late night flight to the Southern Hemisphere.

After a quick couple of days in Sydney to see my cousin Jenna (who will be away when I come back through in a few weeks), I jumped a plane across the Tasman Sea to Auckland. There I began my three week trip through New Zealand, which I am three days into.

That's all for now

-Gavin
Sent via BlackBerry by AT&T

Link to Safari Photos

Here is a link to Gavin's Safari Photos

Safari: Part 2

After seeing the elephants off at Tarangire, we headed back to Arusha. Thankfully, the majority of the trip was done over paved roads. We stopped for lunch at a different coffee lodge. I had the earliest flight out of Arusha. Catherine and Fabrizio were headed to Zanzibar for some sun, and Mary, Diane and Cynthia were heading back to Australia. It was a bit of a race to the airport, as there was quite a bit of traffic in Arusha. While I had flown to Tanzania from Nairobi’s international airport, I was flying back through the smaller Wilson airport, so I could catch a bush flight to Masai Mara. As I checked in, I had to pay and extra fee for overweight baggage. I had 35 pounds of bags, including carry on. There was no paperwork, and the cash went into the check in agent’s pocket. This is Africa.

My original flight was running late, so I was moved onto an earlier one, so as to make my connection. The check in consisted of matching your name against a list of passengers. As you can imagine it went very smoothly, with only 5 passengers on the plane. As I walked out to the plane, I became less impressed. While I’m not a nervous flying by any stretch of the imagination, I was not thrilled to see a Cessna 208B, with the first officer’s seat empty, and a captain named Moses. One engine/one pilot is not a confidence inspiring combination, and as there were no bodies of water between Arusha and Nairobi, neither was the captain. We endured a moderately bumpy flight back to Nairobi. The entire area sits at roughly 5,000 feet of elevation and the planes, which are not pressurized, have a ceiling of 10,000, so the plane’s altitude over the ground is not that high. Add in heat thermals and you have a fairly bumpy flight. My transfer at Wilson airport was quite smooth, and I was much more at ease, with the DeHaviland Twin Otter I boarded for my flight to Masai Mara. It has two engines, and had two pilots at the controls. After an hours flight, we landed on the dirt strip that is Musiara Airstrip.

Someone from the camp I was staying at met me, and it was a short drive to get there. In Masai Mara, I stayed a permanent tented camp that’s been there for 30+ years. The tents line the banks of the Mara River. It was an incredible place. The place had a serenity and feel to it that was unlike anywhere I’d been in my life. Wildlife wandered in and out of the camp at will, and after dinner, security guards walked you back to your tent as you never knew what animals might be behind the next bush (or tent). My first night, there were hippos in the camp, and elephants had a taste for some leaves that grew right over my tent. I woke up at 2am to a deep guttural rumbling that I felt in the pit of my stomach. It is the way elephants communicate and the source of the noise was very, very close. My better judgment won out over my curiosity, and I stayed in my tent.

I arrived in the late afternoon owing to some delays with flights. After a quick introduction to the camp, I set out with my guide, Koech for a quick afternoon game drive. As I would find out later, Koech has been a guide in Masai Mara for over 25 years. He is an incredible source of information, and he really enjoys what he does. At this point it was already getting dark, but we were very fortunate. Within 10 minutes of leaving the camp gates, we came upon a pride of lions, relaxing in the afternoon sun. It was an indicator of things to come. As the sun set, we headed back to camp, where I met up with the other people I would be sharing a truck with. While the Land Cruisers in Tanzania were outfitted for long haul travel, the Land Rovers in Masai Mara were solely for game viewing. They were open topped, with seating for 6 passengers, although our only had 3. Along with our guide Koech, I shared the Land Rover with David and Demian, two brothers from the States (Demian lives in Carmel Valley, small world).

While in Tanzania we moved from place to place, in Kenya, we went back to the same camp every night. One of the side benefits of this was that we grew accustomed to the big cats living around us. During my stay in the Mara, we encountered 3 different lions prides, a young female cheetah, and a mother cheetah with 3 sub-adult cubs, on multiple days. Each of these was distinguishable from the others, and it was very interesting to see unique behaviors and how the big cats related to one another. The area of Masai Mara we stayed in was also where the BBC/Animal Planet series “Big Cat Diary” was filmed. We saw many of the same cats they profiled, and the small amount of time they spend filming does not do them justice.

On our first full day in the Mara, we set out as the sun was rising. The first animal we encountered was a jackal, which does not come out in the broad daylight. They are scavengers, but easily outmuscled by hyena and even vultures. We soon saw vultures circling, and went to investigate. We found an almost fully eaten wildebeest carcass. (I would later realize that this was the work of the Marsh pride, the lions that lived closest to the camp.) It was surrounded by vultures and marabou storks. There are certain parts of a prey animal that cats, hyenas and jackals won’t eat, most notably the digestive tract, due to its bacteria. While hyenas can digest bone, vultures are immune to the harmful bacteria.

As we moved away from the vultures, our guide Koech saw something off in the distance. We quickly realized this was a hunting cheetah. We quickly raced off to try and get there before anything happened. As we were a few hundred yards off, we saw the cheetah break. It is really incredible to see something that fast in action. The cheetah was chasing after a young Thompson’s gazelle. She quickly caught it, and was just moving it to a sheltered place to eat as we were approaching. Life is not easy for cheetahs. They are solitary hunters, who hunt by day. Their success ratio on stalking prey is relatively low, and they are easily outmuscled by lions or hyenas once they make a kill. As a result they have to eat very quickly. Nonetheless, we were very lucky, and watched her as she ate. I will spare the more gory details, but we did not see much as she was eating in a patch of long grass.

This young female cheetah had become specialized in hunting young Thompson’s gazelle. Rather than stalk the herd, risk being seen, and expending large amount of energy in the process, she would casually walk up to the heard, looking for young animals close to her. As the animals would flee, younger, slower gazelle would be readily apparent. It was like a hunter who sent his dog to flush out ducks. She would not have to run nearly as fast to catch a young gazelle, and losing surprise wasn’t as much of a detriment.

After seeing the cheetah kill, we moved along, and came up on some young adult members of the Marsh pride who had made another kill and had eaten their fill of wildebeest. While they were not actively eating, the lions were still not very happy about vultures getting to it. The lions would periodically chase off the vultures. With the lions relaxing in their version of the food coma, we moved on. As we headed back towards camp for breakfast, we went along the river, and spent some time fooling around with a troop of baboons. All would be quiet until someone in the truck pulled a face, and would send the baboons scurrying off, jumping off trees, or doing other strange things.

After grabbing breakfast, we headed off to try and find one of the more spectacular occurrences, the annual wildebeest crossing of the Mara River. Wildebeest use the same crossing points year after year, even though there are numerous other ones that are much less dangerous. We timed our arrival very well. The herd was massing for a crossing, and we didn’t have to wait long. The actual crossing itself is a bit strange. A small group of wildebeest will go down to the riverbank and mull about. The herd will follow them down, but it takes a few tries. Often, the leaders won’t like what they see and will turn back, going back up to graze. A new group will come down and do the same thing. Eventually, one group actually jumps, and the herd mentality kicks in. We were in Masai Mara near the end of the wildebeest season there. Most of the herd had already crossed at this point. We saw a group of roughly 2000 animals cross, of a total population believed to be 1.8 Million. Of the 2000, we only counted six that were taken by crocodiles, but they tried for far more. Many of the crocs we saw were massive, truly ancient, and had a menacing ‘grin’ on their faces. They are believed to live up to an age of roughly 70, and never stop growing. Many of these larger ones had clearly been feeding heavily on wildebeest. We stayed on after the crossing to watch the crocs eat what they had taken.

From there, we headed on to look for more animals. It seemed what ever we said we wanted to see, would show up within 30 minutes. We decided to try for leopard, and we soon rewarded with a leopard, crouched on a fallen tree, just relaxing. Leopards are known to be more skittish than any other big cat, and we were amazed how calm it was. My guess was, given its proximity to the camp, this leopard was fairly used to humans. It stayed for about 15 minutes, but as another truck drove up, it decided to leave.

Before the sun set, we got some more time with the Marsh pride, and came upon eleven of them all relaxing. While we had seen numerous females and sub adults, we hadn’t yet seen the big males of the pride. One of them was there this time, and we got very, very close to him. It was the one time the entire trip, where I was uneasy about our proximity to the animals while in the vehicle. Needless to say, this encounter produced to spectacular photographs.

The next morning we set out again, and encountered the Marsh pride, in the middle of their meal. The males and adult females had already eaten and resting, and the sub adults were coming in for their turn at the wildebeest. The amount of playing that goes on amongst siblings and cousins in a pride gives these cats a human-ness that really can’t be described. The ‘teenagers’ would bound up, usually chasing or wrestling with each other in the process, and then greet each of the adult females and show their respect by rubbing heads with each of the adult family members. Only then would the go and eat. We stayed around for quite a while and saw the sub adults finish their turn, and go off to drink.

At that point we left the Marsh pride and headed back in the direction where we saw the wildebeest crossing. It wasn’t long before we came up on a family of cheetahs. For those that watch Big Cat Diary, the cheetah we found is named Shakirah. She originally had a litter of 5 cubs, but only 3 females survived. The cubs are now almost fully grown but the family lives and hunts together. We found them resting on top of a large termite mound. The cheetah cubs are as playful as the young lions and it was amazing to watch these usually solitary cats interacting with each other. They would wrestle and chase each other, but the chasing was much faster, and the movement more elegant. Cheetahs’ elongated bodies are really built for running. They played around for a while and then moved off together. We were a bit confused because we had seen gazelle and impala in the other direction but the cheetahs seemed to be headed off towards nothing. Suddenly all four broke into a run, and we saw what they were after. There were some young warthogs nearby and the group of cheetahs was trying to get one. Cheetahs are usually solitary hunters, and warthogs are dangerous food even for lions and leopards. There was a bit of a melee around the warthogs as cheetahs chased babies, and the adults chased the cheetahs. The adults managed to give the babies enough time to get into the burrow before running off to ensure they didn’t become food either.

We moved farther towards the river and encountered another lion pride, the Paradise pride. This pride had three females, each with cubs of different age, ranging from newborns to 5 months old. Even the newborns moved like lions, albeit a little more clumsily. The one mother kept her cubs herself, but the other two, evidently sisters, would take turns watching all 4 cubs. Two of the cubs were left in reeds, a hundred yards from the two females. As we pulled up, they came out to drink from a puddle that was just near them. This encounter produced one of my favorite images from the trip, of the two drinking side by side.

The morning of my final full day in Kenya, Demian and David decided to do a walking safari in the morning, leaving me to go in search of a lion stalk and kill, similar to the one I’d seen in Serengeti. It was not to be, as the Marsh pride seemed to kill right before dawn. There were some more fantastic lion moments with the Marsh Pride and Paradise Pride, however the real highlight came in the afternoon, when Demian, David and I ventured across the river in search of black rhino. These animals are extremely endangered, with a wild population believed to be less than 3,000. They are so threatened by illegal poaching, that at one point, every black rhino was given around-the-clock armed protection. There are though to be fewer than 70 in Masai Mara. After spending a few hours driving around, we found a mother and baby, who fed briefly before moving back into the densely wooded bush.

On our last day, we set out early, and took our breakfast with use, heading to a part of the reserve we hadn’t been to before. On the way, we encountered a lioness with three very young cubs, and a male. These were from a third pride, the Ridge pride. After our extended morning game drive, we returned to camp for lunch, and packing our bags. While Tanzania had been great, Masai Mara was in a completely different league. The camp I stayed at in Kenya is managed by a fantastic couple, Colin and Chala, who I became friendly with during my time there. Colin is South African (Eastern Cape) and Chala is a native Kenyan. They are a big part of what makes the camp a very special place. It is so serene and feels like home. I was really fortunate to meet great people on the trip, and I took off from Musiara airstrip sad to be leaving. It really was an incredible trip.