Maasai Mara photos

Maasai Mara

The second day at Maasai Mara we left before 7:30am and didn't return until after 7:00pm. We spent the whole day in the park, frequently stopping to identify birds or watch other wildlife. We did make it to the river where we saw hippos and Nile crocodiles.

This post is primarily a photo interlude with photos from our guide's facebook, our cellphones, and a few pictures from the web.

Another of James' photos of the Cheetah and her cubs from our first evening at Maasai Mara.

 

Video I took with my iPhone from the car of the cheetah family on the first evening. 

[Karen: watch for the little one who's lagging behind and then comes bounding up! This same cub did this several times, both when we watched the group on the first evening and when we caught up with them on our third day -- interesting.]

Zebra near the road in the park. 

Buffalo under an acacia tree.

Elephants

Spotted hyena.

Sleepy hyena cooling off in a puddle. We saw a few hyenas doing this.

Three lion bachelors sleeping.. It must have been a rough night!

Warthogs. We saw a lot of these. Most frequently a single adult with 3 watoto (kids).
[Karen: the Swahili for warthog is "ngiri", uncannily close to "nigiri", a word that sushi-lovers will recognize.]

Topi. One ran alongside us for a while. (from Google Images)

The lioness carrying a topi fetus to her cubs. Yes, we watched this!

Grey-crowned crane. Large with a fuzzy crown à la Dr. Seuss. The national bird of Uganda.

Kenya's national bird: the lilac-brested roller.

The lilac-brested roller in flight.

Acacia tree with black-headed weaver bird nests.

Speke's weaver.

Marabou stork. A very stately carrion eater also known as the undertaker. (from Wikipedia)

There were a lot of things that we saw and don't have pictures for. Here are some of the notes I made of the more interesting things we saw:

• A dung beetle creating a dung ball larger than it was.
• A hippo baby and mother yawning at each other.
• Crocodiles basking alongside the river with their mouths open. They don't have tongues, but still pant like dogs to cool off.
• A leopard tortoise seen following after an actual leopard.
• A giraffe carrying 20 oxpeckers on its back.
• A large, dark blue-violet wasp.
• A troop of banded mongoose (mongeese?) playing.
• Jackals looking like a cross between a coyote and a fox.
• Baboons stalking groups of tourists hoping to mooch some of their lunch
• Limping zebra with an obvious, large, red, raw wound.
• Dead bright green snake with black patterning
• Vultures and marabou stork feasting on a dead topi.
• Kneeling marabou storks kneeling with engorged gular sacks, digesting bones?
• Bright yellow weaver birds building nests from fresh, green grass.
• A hornbill dropping lichen into a large hole in a tree where its mate was nesting.