By 6;30 am this morning we were in our safari vehicle headed down the 600 meters into the Ngorongoro Crater. The crater is a circular depression about 20 km across surrounded by mountains that range up to 3600 meters. The mountains supply the crater with fresh water and hence the grass lands at the bottom of the crater have become home for many animals. As a result the crater is a big attraction for tourists (like us) wanting to see Africa's wildlife.

Our day got off to a great start, not long after getting to the crater floor we (with a few dozen others) got to watch a pride of lions laze in the grass. Saw a couple of mother lion chase out of the pride a large male that made the mistake of chastising one of the cubs, got some real closeups of a couple of males when they decided to cross the road between some of the safari vehicles. Many elephants, wilder beast, assorted gazelles, hyenas, and jackals later we got to watch a male ostrich perform his mating dance and the subsequent reward from the female subject of his attention.

We lunched at a picnic spot on the edge of a swamp with 50 other safari vehicles and over chicken and cheese watched a group of hippos bobbing up and down in the deeper part of the swamp. Following lunch we saw another large group of hippos in a shallower swamp splashing themselves and rolling over in the water to keep their backs wet.

Today and the days at Oliver's Camp have way exceeded our expectation in terms of the animals we have seen, the number and the closeness and the variety, yet we are only a little way into our adventure.