Awesome African Adventure. Day 28 – May 6, 2025

Departing Serengeti and Tanzania via Seronera Airstrip and Arusha.

Leaving Serenity Camp, a few airports and flights today and two Countries.

Sad again. After three nights with the Serenity Camp crew I feel a connection and sadness to leave. The likelihood of ever returning is slim. It’s also our last hours on the Serengeti Endless Plains. We had a couple of hours game drive prior to being dropped off at the Seronera Airport.

The game drive delivered straight up with a mother and young giraffe not 500m down the track

Defassa Waterbuck – f white rump. Common waterbuck have the toilet seat bum.
Three banded plover in ‘Plover Creek’
Black Chested Snake Eagle.
Tawny Eagle
Defassa Waterbuck – male
Secretary birds. Pencils out of head, long legs, short black skirt, struts like high heals, busy bird when hunting the feet are like a typewriting. Secretary is Arabic word for hunter – they are good hunters.
Fischer lovebird
Banded Mongoose.
Super close and camouflaged giraffe. Who came even closer. Some of the shots are obstructed by the roof of the car cos he was feeding in the tree next to us. He came to us!!! JB said it’s the closest he has seen a giraffe to the Troopy.
Dark Chanting Goshawk.
Batalu in flight
Tawny Eagle with kill.
We visited some sort of hostel village, used by the workers and people driving through the Serengeti. A few bars and hostels.
Then to Hippo Haven with some Egyptian Geese and Goslings. The Hippos can walk 5 kms away and they poo and pee (like a breadcrumbs trail) to find their way back. They also poop and pee in the river to mark their territory/spot, so as to prevent territorial fights.
There was a dead one and a big full croc on the bank.

Farewell to JB at Seronera Airstrip. Last photos with the vehicle and JB. Sad to say goodbye. You really do bond with a good guide and we’ve had two brilliant men showing us around. JB’s parting handshake and farewell words were “Mountains never meet, people always do.” A great way to move forward – Sawa Sawa. (This is what JB said when it was time to move on from a stop – I assume it means let’s go. I asked Ishmail later it’s Ok Ok!)
The guy who took our photos also took our bags, checked us in and sent us through scanning then finally called us through the door to the plane when the time came
⁃ a man of many hats and roles.
We had another small plane ride back to Arusha which is much preferable to a 7-9 hour drive that would have seen us having to leave at 5am to make our 6:30 flight from Arusha/Kilimanjaro airport to Addis Ababa.
The flight link flight was about 50minutes with some views over the Serengeti and the Ngorongoro Crater. Quite cloudy so lots of shadows on the ground and occasionally blockout in the air.
Some interesting sights as always when flying on a little plane.

Touch down at 12:33 at Arusha Domestic Airport.

Met with Alex our driver and bundled into an extremely comfortable black Toyota Vellfire van (Tarago) Then off to meet Ishmail for the handback of my camera lens and a coffee (and we ate our packed lunches) at a nice coffee lounge. Ish is a really nice bloke and was keen to hear how we went and to apologise for the car issues.
Then it was back into the car with Alex for the trip to Kilimanjaro International Airport. We arrived just after 3:35 for our 6:25 flight to Addis.
Every airport has different requirements- we were straight into the first scanner – everything off – shoes, watch, belt.
Aunty Sue’s luggage was hauled out and basically unpacked by the security guy – with Aunty Sue trying to keep him from totally messing with her meticulous neatly packed luggage. After no ‘offending’ round item was found he spied my bag over with us.
I took it over to be searched. Turned out I had the offending item – my new spiky physio ball!!! He took it and went and checked and came back with it – all ok!! Meanwhile Suzie was still repacking her bag. NOT HAPPY JAN!!!
Then onto documentation check. Man, did they want to know the in and outs of our plans and movements. Where had we been, where were going? Which hotel in Madagascar, our Madagascar VISA, our return tickets home to Australia, yellow fever certificate. Mary and Suzie were put through the wringer while Phil and I readied our documents – only to be waved through. Then came check in. Due to our plane cancellations, our new itinerary requires and almost 12 hour layover in Addis Ababa. Ethiopian airlines provide a voucher for hotel and transport for anyone with such a layover. However, we are not reading good reviews about the hotel they use – so wanted to ask if it’s possible to upgrade. Check in staff were unable to help- not surprisingly! Then came the issue about seat allocations, which we had paid for, and we weren’t allocated our original seats. Suzie asked for seats closer to the front. We couldn’t get together so eventually accepted row 46, which turned out to be exit rows with nice legroom. Finally through check in to the lounge to cool down – literally and figuratively!
Onto the plane easily. The plane was very empty, so Suzie jumped into an empty row behind before takeoff. I moved back a row after takeoff to get a window. We took off almost 30 minutes early and landed at 8:04 – 40 minutes early into a rainy Addis Ababa.
The flight was good, meal ok too. Managed to sort a few photos and write this.
The games began again when we landed as we had to negotiate the hotel issue and find our transport etc. we also had to figure out transit visa and whether we needed it or not.
Well what a pleasant surprise. We made it seamlessly to the Ethiopian Airlines desk after passing through immigration. We had to pay for the upgraded hotel, but the nice man at the Ethiopian Airlines desk arranged it all and we paid at the hotel desk. Too easy.
The Ethiopian Airways Skylight hotel is swanky, we went to the first bar – turned out to be coffee and tea only. Second bar – wine and beer, so the third one was the real bar but it might as well have been a nightclub – too noisy for us – so wine and beer it is for tonight. Then shower and sleep before our pick up at 6:55 in the morning.
The room is nicely appointed and we are ready for bed. No time to blog tonight. 11:30. Goodnight!