After a great night, birdwatching in the morning and breakfast we are ready to start our exploration of Tarangire. Our plan is to drive towards Silale Swamp, as much as we can and look for birds and mammals on the way. Then at lunch the plan is to return eat lunch and then relax and leave later in the afternoon for an afternoon drive. At least now as we leave we know how long the one lane access road is and stop on it multiple times to take photos, especially dik-diks that are surprisingly common here.
One thing that is different from the previous day and we learn it is quite important to do in National Parks, we open the top. Tsetse flies be damned we need to have a great view of the birds and mammals. Like the beautiful Emerald spotted Wood-dove we see right before the intersection with the main road. And also it is easier to see the unexpected Leopard tortoises, we had no idea they are so common.
On the main road we are going now into terra incognita again. We had no idea how the road is but we are worried especially about the bridge over the Tarangire river. Which on our map software says “bridge out” but otherwise nothing points to it.
Birds are quite common with the first new bird on this stretch being a beautiful Gray-headed Kingfisher, one of those kingfishers you can see farther from the water.
The weather is quite nice after the rain at night. The sun is not out, so we do not boil, but it also doesn’t rain as we continue on through the special landscape.
Mammal wise we encounter again elephants, which is what Tarangire is famous for, and birdwise we see our first Yellow-necked Spurfowl, a beautiful bird.
And on we proceed through the savanna keeping a close eye for anything that moves either on the ground or in flight. Needless to say that means we are going quite slow but we are not a hurry.
At a small pond we first assume that nothing is around and then that there is a flock of doves before putting the binoculars on them and noticing that all of them are Collared Pratincoles, what a find for us! We are watched by a warthog who seems to be alone, a bit unusual.
Next we pass next to the airport which seems to be quite active today, it seems we captured one of the regular planes leaving, fun.
Our first vervet monkey follows soon, well first troop not monkey, where there is one there are many.
And then we turn towards the river and the bridge. Which is there, no issues. So yeah, not all information is accurate obviously but this is good news for us as we can proceed over it to Silale Marsh.
We cross slowly enjoying the great views of the river and scanning the sides for any interesting birds. However besides a grey heron we only see a few shorebirds so on we go.
Somehow the stretch after the bridge is much busier, maybe many cars take the road on the other side of the river from different lodges.
The road to Silale Marsh Picnic Area is a bit worse than what we drove on previously. It is more bumpy and you have to be more careful and go slower but nothing technical.
Most of the cars we met had a specific goal in mind, the Silale Marsh Picnic Area. it is lunch time so most stop here for lunch and it is quite busy versus the rest of the road. We don’t have any food with us as we plan to return to the lodge but can pick up some ice cold drinks from our cooler to compensate for the heat. Which with the sun out is quite oppresive if you are not in the shade.
Here we see our first Silverbird, a weirdly named bird as it has no silver, looks like a swallow and is actually a flycatcher.
The picnic areas in Tanzania all have toilet blocks and at least where we travelled all were in good working order and quite clean. This is true also about Silale March. Also we enjoyed that the cleaners were not begging or even requesting money like it happened in India.
Back in the parking area we look for some of the specialties and find one, Rufous-tailed weavers, a near endemic and relatively rare bird otherwise.
With so many people here we are happy that we didn’t plan to eat lunch here so after birding we take our car and it is time to return to the lodge hopefully before the end of the lunch time.
We go much faster now even we are surprised how fast we arrive back at the lodge if we go without stopping. No birds and no mammals will stop us from lunch. We arrive in time and eat the great lunch before a couple hours of relaxation and then we go again exploring in the other direction in the afternoon.
