On the 10th of February it had been very heavy rain at night, but luckily weather was nice in the morning. When the sun was rising, we walked to have breakfast and got several Grey-capped Social Weavers to join us even inside the tent. After the breakfast we climbed to our cars and started driving inside Serengeti.
It was now rainy season and very green everywhere, but the rains had started very late so all migrating animals were late on their usual schedule and still on the way to Serengeti. That’s why we had seen so many mammals on the previous evening – they were close but not yet inside the park. So we didn’t see a single Gnu and only a few Zebras inside the park.
Some birds we saw early in the morning were Nubian Woodpecker, Dark-chanting Goshawk, Village Weaver, funny-sounding Flappet Lark, Bearded Woodpecker, Silverbird, Foxy Lark, Grey-backed Fiscal, White-tailed Lark, Black-faced Waxbill, Meyer’s Parrot, Slate-colored Boubou, Bateleur, Purple Grenadier, Pin- and Straw-tailed Whydah, Yellow-bellied Eremomela, Croaking Cisticola, Gabar Goshawk, Grey-headed Silverbill, African Hoopoe, Tanzanian Red-billed Hornbill, Magpie Shrike, Rüppell’s Starling, Bare-faced Go-away-bird, Vitelline Masked Weaver and Usambiro Barbet. We also got nice pictures of Black- and White-bellied Bustards, a Woolly-necked Stork and so on. We also saw some mammals like Impalas, Serengeti Topis, Common Dwarf Mongooses, Cavendish’s Dik-diks, Cape Buffaloes with some Yellow-billed Oxpeckers on their backs and also some Leopard Tortoises and a flap-necked Chameleon were seen. We also got familiar with tsetse-flies, but luckily there weren’t many of them or other insects either.
After quite a lot of driving and birding, we arrived to a high area where were a couple of meters long spiky trees here and there. This was area for rare Karamoja Apalis. So we started to stop every couple of hundreds of meters and played tapes in both cars. Anthony told that this species was difficult to see as, if it comes, it comes quiet, stays in a tree for a short time and then disappears. We had once again continued after a long try when we our friends on the other car called us that they had found one bird. We managed to get back (frustratingly slowly) but luckily the bird was still there and we got this rare endemic to our list! In same time there was a herd of Elephants walking on the savanna behind the spiky trees so it was very nice moment!
We kept on getting further and soon found a Pygmy Falcon on a tree next to the road. Then Anthony started playing the tape again but now from a moving car. But it seemed that all birds had disappeared, but then a flock of birds flew over us and they were exactly what we had been searching for – Grey-crested Helmetshrikes! Shrikes were flying around and only shortly stopped to some distant bushes but after all we managed to get some pictures. These birds were really funny-looking.
After a short drive we stopped to a plateau where we could see were big trees further on the mountain side. Soon we saw a Woodland Kingfisher and then the next bird was a nice surprise – a beautiful Black-headed Gonolek! Almost same time the tape lured an amazing-looking Schalow’s Turaco to the trees further and after some time we could see it in flight but then it also perched quite openly but unfortunately quite far. Von der Decken’s Hornbill landed very close to us and soon the tape worked again as a couple of huge Eastern Plantain-eaters were seen in flight on the top of very distant trees. This had been one of the most memorable stops ever – we had seen several amazing birds in very short time!
We drove quite fast back to our camp and after the lunch we had some time to photograph common birds in the camp. I got pictures of Superb and Rüppell’s Starlings and Swahili Sparrows, also a Red-throated Tit was found from the parking place.
In the afternoon we drove in the park again and saw Desert and Lyne’s Cisticolas, a Long-crested Eagle, Fischer’s Lovebirds, Grey-breasted Spurfowls and Arrow-marked Babblers.The best observation was a Cheetah that we saw with help of a car that stopped to tell us about it. The cat had disappeared to the vegetation for some time ago but luckily we found it quite soon. And after some waiting it got up and gave us better views! We were very happy!
Once we were driving again I finally saw a Pearl-spotted Owlet that I had missed earlier and also the first Wahlberg’s Eagle, an African Hawk-Eagle and a couple of Yellow-throated Bush Sparrows were seen. In the evening we had really good light for photographing and as we were in no hurry, we got very good opportunities to get pictures. Edson was stopping every time we asked and he was actually the most talkative of the locals and told us many interesting stories during the trip.
We were back in the camp before the sunset and then we had dinner and log again. I got into our tent again so that a local was escorting me. Mika stayed up much later once again.