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Marvels Of The Masai Mara Game Reserve. A Safari Into The Mara Is An Experience To The Supreme Wildlife Park.
Evidently the Mara is the top savanna of Africa Safari. A bird's eye view of the action below stirs my anticipation.
Within a few minutes of flying into the Mara, we see an elephant and giraffes beneath, and on the banks of the Talek River, a pair of hippos somewhat exposed from the water.
It's end of June, just following long rains and the period before the great migration and the savanah is brimming with tall golden green grass of different patterns.
As we steer through, we run into many Thomson's gazelles browsing by the roadside.
Farther, a parenting cheetah with a round belly gazes our way as it eats the remains of an antelope. Meanwhile the cub is still enjoying the kill, its nose reddish with blood.
"Cheetahs are diurnal. They hunt at daytime," explains the guide. "They are not as strong as lions and leopards, so they eat fast otherwise their kill will be taken. They can even be driven away by packs hyenas or vultures."
Seven minutes away, we stumble upon another cheetah and her two cubs on an anthill. They view us cautiously but the mother's ears pick the sounds of the cowbells and she sits up conscious, sweeping the plains. The flock of Masai cows is way in the distant and sensing no risk to her cubs, she slouches down again, easy.
The big rains have halted and the plains are full of grass making it frustrating for the smaller species to graze. Mostly it is the big animals like giraffes and elephants and the bigger antelopes that can be effortlessly be seen around.
This makes hunting challenging for the cats and they wind up with strange tactics. It is not uncommon to see lions and cheetahs trying to mount trees and anthills to get a high vantage spot for searching for prey.
Cheetahs claws cannot retract like those other cats and would not often climb trees, but because they must locate prey, they'll attempt anything.
Cheetahs, not like other predators, are not strong so they hunt smaller-sized antelopes, by running them to exhaustion as they target the jugular vein of the prey to make an easy kill.
Minutes after sighting the second cheetah, we find another cheetah Mother (Shakira).
"Shakira had five cubs but two were killed," the guide quips. "Cheetah mothers continuously keep shifting when they have cubs to avoid lions and leopards harming their cubs."
Ahead a pride of twelve lions emerges consisting of a male, females and cubs. The male roars, the roar echoing over the plains, as it flips over on its back. The females stand up ready to roam the plains.
"This is my best time in the Masai Mara," says the guide, "because there is minimal traffic and makes it easy to see wildlife."
In another couple of days it will be July, and the plains will start filling with wildebeests as they move from the Serengeti.
There will be a million plus wildebeests passing the Sand River and going to the other end of the Mara before whirling to make the cyclic process. By the end of November, all grass will be consumed by the wildebeests and some 400000 zebras and other wildlife.
In one afternoon, in a radius of 10 km, we have experienced lots of animals. What a way to start our Masai Mara safari.
The next day, as the sun goes up in the horizon, the plains seem quieter. This sunrise we head out seeking for the big five.
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