Safari - Travel to Ndutu

 We immediately hit the road after our Balloon ride.

A saddle billed stork.

Hippopotami

A pair of ostriches

We saw flamingoes at Lake Natron, but I had no camera for that excursion.  Fortunately, I got this second opportunity.

Just before arriving to camp, we encountered this family of Helmeted Guinea Fowl

What a trip!

Ballooning over the Serengeti

 One of the highlights of this journey was ballooning over the Serengeti.  I booked this beforehand as I knew that a balloon ride in general was on my wife's bucket list, and I couldn't think of a better place to do it.  The lenses I brought were specifically to capture the elements of this momentous occasion, and yet, our driver failed to give me my lens bag before we took off.  So, I was stuck with my 12mm lens for the occasion.  It gave some interesting wide angle shots.

We had to get up at 3:30am to make it in time to the launch site and see sunrise.

After the balloon ride, we had lunch and found this close relative of the elephant, a rock hyrax

A final video of our balloon ride.

Ikoma

 From Masai Boma, we had a travel day to Ikoma.

Caught a picture of a secretary bird.

A leopard tortoise.

More lions

Here is a Rufous Naped Lark

And a Pale Chanting Goshawk.

The next day we spotted a big herd of Cape Buffalo

We didn't see a lot of Nile Crocodile, but we did find a couple.

The lesser striped swallow

A three banded plover

A close-up

A white-headed vulture in flight

Not our most prolific safari, but some good finds.