Winston was our relief driver - he normally works for Hoopoe Adventure Tours, and he turned out to be incredible. He was personable, knowledgeable, and obviously passionate about what he does. He also had incredible vision. In our four hours we saw everything - tons of lions, hippos, cheetahs, black rhino, all the standards (except giraffe - they don't live in the crater; but including huge herds of wildebeest, zebra, and buffalo), tons of large birds (including ostrich, greater and lesser flamingos, the beautiful gray crowned crane, great white pelicans, secretarybirds and Kori Bustards).

By far the highlight of the day was the lions. Near the beginning of the drive we found a group of lions feeding on some earlier kill. They were quite some distance away, but Winston decided they were going to move because some Masai were bringing their cattle to drink at a nearby water hole, and parked the car where he thought they might go. There were about ten lions and as predicted they soon moved away from the water. They went different ways, but three of them came right at us. The largest of the three was a huge female whose entire muzzle was soaked in blood - she and two other lionesses brushed against the back of our car as they walked by - less than four feet below us! Even better the large one stopped and made eye contact scarcely a yard away. We also saw several smaller groups, and lone lions - though none as close. Later in the drive came on a male and a female feeding on something - they weren't that close, but close enough for some great pictures (I hope...).

At the lakeside we sat and watched a huge number of bright pink lesser flamingos mingle with some larger greater flamingos and a small herd of hippopotamuses - so stereotypical Africa it looked staged.

Next, I jokingly requested cheetahs - Winston said he'd try, and shortly after our close encounter with the lioness we stopped at a grassy field and Winston announced there was a cheetah there. It took the rest of us about ten minutes with binoculars and zoom lenses to find it, and meanwhile Winston had found two more. They were way out there - too far for the photos to turn out great - but he did find us cheetahs!

He found us some black rhinos - they were lying down and far away, but he brought us back later when they were moving around so we could at least see them. We also saw several more herds of hippos and some incredible scenery - remember this is all at the bottom of a giant crater.

After a wild ride up the crater wall (Winston was not a conservative driver) we were back at the camp at exactly three and... no car. The car and driver showed up half an hour later - right after the cook went with Winston to try and find them. Pretty much perfect timing and I was very glad that we hadn't been waiting since one! We needed to give the driver another US$ 80 to pay for the repairs (again we were promised to be paid back in Arusha) and we were off. Two hours of very bad road got us nearly back around Lake Manyara to the paved road when we ran out of gas! It was almost comical as we all got behind the land rover and pushed it for twenty minutes to the bottom of a hill. Sent the cook off to get a gallon of petrol and the rest of us sat around and watched the sun turn red as it slowly started to sink into the surrounding bush. The cook came back, we filled up with gas, and a fairly quick two hours later we were at the safari office in Arusha.

In Arusha we got the red carpet treatment. The manager was very apologetic about the difficulties, reimbursed us the $160, and offered to put Amy and I up in a nice hotel and pay for our dinner rather than sending us off to the campground we were supposed to stay at. We'd then continue on to nearby Arusha National park in the morning. Amy had started feeling a little off on the ride back to Arusha so this suited us. We checked in, went to the great Indian restaurant again (still good) and went to bed.