“Adventure is a wonderful thing” – Owl

For those of you who are not fans of Winnie the Pooh you may not recognize this quote nor know who Owl is.  Owl is of course the wise old owl who assures Pooh and his friends that the adventures that they have while searching for Christopher Robin will be, in short, “wonderful.”

After our update at the University on Friday we headed out to Ruaha National Park.  For those who have never been there, Ruaha is the largest park in Africa.  It boasts all of the animals found elsewhere except for the rhino.

It is a three hour drive over rough roads to the park from Iringa.  We had an uneventful drive out and a pleasant stay at the park.  We tried to count all of the different kinds of animals we saw, but lost count around the mid thirties and gave up.  This morning, Sunday, we headed back to Iringa to get ready for the training sessions which start tomorrow. 

After breakfast we discovered that our car wouldn't start!  Unlike “the beast” that we have driven in  prior years, we are driving a pretty respectable vehicle this year (only 225,000 miles recorded on the odometer).  It had been running very well until last Wednesday when the battery died and it refused to start with a jump.  This turned out to be a wiring problem and was resolved – we thought. 

After discovering that we need a jump, Tom climbed back up to the restaurant (it is a two and a half story climb to the restaurant from our “banda,” or cabin) and requested help.  Twenty minutes later the car roared to life and we started down the road.  About two miles from our camp the road started to get very rough.  Then, very VERY rough.  Tom suspected we had a flat tire, and got out to check.  Not only was the tire flat – we were driving on the wheel and the tire was limply wrapped around it.  Tom didn't feel like spending the morning changing a tire on the truck so he opted to take a hike back to the registration office.  A half hour later he returned to the vehicle with the mechanic who had started the vehicle an hour and a half earlier.   

The mechanic changed the tire in about 20 minutes then told us to wait while he went back and put a temporary patch on the tire (since you are at least an hour and a half from anyone when you are out here you do not want to be on the road without some type of spare). When he returned with the patched tire he told us that he had discovered a sharp rock that had pierced the sidewall.  As we headed towards the park entrance, it was now 2 ½ hours since we left our banda.

When we arrived at the entrance, the guard asked us to give his wife a ride to Iringa.  This is actually a common thing out here – buses can take all day and do not run on regular schedules, so having a rider is really not a big deal.  We made room for her to get in and we continued on our way.

As we are driving along Sandy mentioned that trouble comes in threes.  We hoped that a malfunctioning seat-belt was the third thing, but we were wrong.

We made it down the “never-ending road” in good time.  That road would be a terrible place for a breakdown because it is a long ways from anywhere, and in the low tourist season, not very well traveled.  We turned towards Iringa and continued down a road where we saw no signs of civilization for close to an hour.  Then we met some Masai herding their cattle, soon we saw cultivated fields, houses, churches and worshipers returning from Sunday services. 

We were looking forward to being home in the next hour or so when Tom realized the engine had quit.  We coasted to a stop and tried to re-start it.  The battery was cranking fine, but there was no fire. 

We hadn't been out of the vehicle long before two men stopped to see what was up.  Soon there were three heads under the hood trying to see if they could spot anything.  Tom didn't know what he was looking at, or for, but he noticed a wire hanging loose inside the engine compartment. (Never a good sign, is it?)  None of the guys with their heads under the hood could see where it should go, however.  A Soma Biblia car stopped to see what was going on.  The driver was familiar with many of our friends in Iringa, but he didn't know how to fix the car.  Meanwhile the first man who had stopped left on his motorcycle to see if he could get someone who knew more about cars to help us out. 

He returned shortly, having driven to the village nearby and gotten a mechanic.  It didn't take him long to discover the problem.  He had brought along wire and some tools, he grabbed the wire and connected it to a power terminal, and the engine roared to life.  We asked the mechanic what we owed him and he humbly said we didn't have to pay him anything.  We did, of course, and we were so pleased to have been rescued by these strangers along the road.

When we reached Iringa we dropped off our passenger before going to our apartment.  Our three-hour return trip from Ruaha had taken us 6.5 hours.  So, we say with Owl, “Adventure is a wonderful thing.”

A look across the Ruaha river is quite a view this time of year.

Our banda is right along the river.

There is a great view from the dining area atop a small hill.

Our banda is really roughing it.

We seldom see monkeys here since they tend to keep to a different part of the park.

We came across a lion pride eating a zebra.  Most of them were in the shade so they did not take good pictures, but this one had to come over and inspect us.

Of course there are always a million or so of these around.

We took some close ups of this eagle, but we liked the way it was framed against the mountains.

The wart hogs were as ugly as ever.

The dung beetles were hard at work.

We took a drive up into the hills.  Lots of rock hyrax and klipspringers.

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We shadowed this elephant herd for awhile.  They couldn't see us clearly (they have such poor eyesight) but they would feel our truck moving.  We were down wind form them so they keep trying to smell us but that did not work either. So they just formed a line to shield the females and young.

We followed this herd of elephants for while.  They just were not sure about us.

The kudu is very shy.  You do not often see them.

Of course giraffes are always good for a picture or two.

We have never understood why they like to stand sideways and look at you.

The bat eared fox is very shy and seldom seen.  We stopped counting the different types of animals we saw when we got to the mid thirties.

On the way back we started off needing a jump.

As things got bumpier and bumpier we realized we had a flat.

Tom did not want to crawl around under the vehicle with the tire so he walked back to get a guide.  Sure hope he doesn't meet the lions! 

The guide changed the tire and then went to put on a temporary patch so we would have a spare.

When the car stopped running we looked under the hood.  Tom spotted a loose wire but we could not find where it went.

When the mechanic showed up Sandy had to take a look.  He knew where the wire went and got it running for us.