Mark Nolting in Kenya, Tanzania and Botswana
Our President Mark Nolting is in Kenya – Day 01-03
Mark is having a fabulous trip inKenya and having fun meeting up with the camp managers.
(L)Evason Nero River Loisaba (R) Martin Scheffer – Manager of Loisaba
(L)Mara Plains Managers – Henry and Hattie Ramsden (R)Sneaking out for a game drive.
(L)Rekero Managers – Peter Thompson and Stacy Matthew’s, and Asilia Kenya Manager Gerard Beaton (R) migration crossings are still happening
Our President Mark Nolting is in Tanzania – Day 04+05
Mark has been in Ngorongoro Crater, Tanzania.
The new Asilia Highlands Lodge – the staff and Juma my guide on the left
The Highlands Village Visit and School Visit
Visiting the new Entamanu Lodge at Ngorongoro – with manager Ben
Great to be back for a visit on the Crater floor.
Our President Mark Nolting is in Tanzania – Day 06
Empakaai and Olmoti Crater walks – Whilst at the Asilia Highlands Camp in the Ngorongoro Crater Conservation Area we went out on two walks. The first was down into the Empakaai Crater, which has a soda lake on the crater floor with Lesser flamingo’s on the lakes edge. We managed to get really close up to the flamingo’s and for me it was some of the best flamingo viewing I’ve ever had. The walk down to the carter floor is 45 minutes and goes through some spectacular forest. The walk up is the same route and took us just under an hour.
Mark with Baraka, the Asilia community guide at the Empakaai Crater floor with the soda lake and Lesser flamingos
Mark and Baraka looking out onto Olmoti Crater with smoke from fires started by the Masai to burn the grass to increase grazing for their cattle
The start to the Olmoti Crater walk is 30 minutes from camp and you walk up onto the Crater rim which takes about 30 minutes. From the crater rim its about 10 minutes down to the crater floor and the waterfall. So all in all the complete Olmoti walk is around one and a half to two hours.
On both walks we were the only guests and had the entire crater floor’s to ourselves.
Our President Mark Nolting is in Tanzania – Day 07
Mark spent his final day visiting with our team of private Tanzania guides in Arusha. He very much enjoyed seeing Ephata, Martin and Hillary who were in town taking a breather from a very busy season of guiding.
We have an education fund for scholarships for over 35 children of the Tanzania guides, now in its 11th year for 2016.
Mark now departs Tanzania on his way down to Botswana!
Our President Mark Nolting is in Botswana – Day 08+09
I have just returned from 2 spectacular nights at Little Mombo. We went out on the first afternoon and went to a wild dog sighting close to the old Mombo Camp. A pack of 18 dogs have settled into the Mombo area and are regularly sighted at the moment. It is so good to have them back in the area. When they became mobile towards the end of the day they headed straight towards Little Mombo. In front of the camp a variety of wildlife including impala, zebra and elephant and lechwe were peacefully grazing, unaware of the impending danger. It was not long before the dogs disrupted the peace. The antelope dashed for cover, but the zebra and elephant stood their ground and we were entertained by a some wonderful interaction. The images show how close the sighting was to the camp. There was absolutely no need to go out on game drive!
The following morning we went out with a mission to find rhino. Undeterred by the fresh lion and leopard tracks around camp we set out on our mission. After a reasonable search and some good tracking we finally found a young male sleeping in a palm island. Soon after that we found a female and sub adult calf feeding nearby on the floodplain. This was an amazing sighting and Marks first rhino sighting since the first release so many years ago.
On the way back to camp our guide Sefo noticed a male giraffe staring intently into the bushes. It was not long before we saw why. A female black rhino was standing quietly in the deep shade of the Acacia trees. We approached cautiously and were rewarded with an amazing sighting. She actually approached us! In the deeper bush we saw movement and noticed a second rhino, but he was having nothing to do with us and bid a fast retreat. We moved off after that and gave them their space.
We all know the potential of Mombo to deliver spectacular wildlife sightings, but after 20 years of direct association with this product, I reckon these last 2 days were two of the most productive ever.
As a farewell, three lionesses walked past the camp in the morning during breakfast….
