The Selous Game Reserve is one of the last places in Tanzania that seems truly wild. At least that's what Lonely Planet says. It did seem pretty wild, although there was a distinct lack of big predators like lions, leopards and cheetahs. However, there was a family of giraffes that seemed to like the landing strip near our camp, and hung out there for a good half hour as we started our walking safari on the second day. If you ever go on safari, I highly recommend the walking type. It's all well and good to be able to zoom around in a car, but you really don't get the full experience unless you can be on the ground and level with the animals. And it's really true, they are more afraid of you than you are of them. Lots of wildlife pictures below:


A baboon, just chilling in his tree-chair.



Same baboon, stretching and posing for the camera



Hippos, which are apparently the most deadly animals in the park. They kill more people each year than the lions, leopards or cheetahs do. Very territorial, but kind of comical. They do this long snorting call that sounds vaguely like a sick donkey's bray.



Momma and baby elephant, so cute!



Impalas, the food of choice on all National Geographic specials...



Giraffes, we saw tons of them!



My mom and our guide Ole, on our walking safari



If you look really closely, you can see retreating zebras. They were really hard to get close to, very skittish.



As we were walking, we started to see vultures all congregating around a particular place. Our guide and armed guard immediately went on alert, and we cautiously approached to find a freshly killed and eaten rabbit. Although we never saw the hunter, our guard thought that it looked like a leopard kill. Scary!



Our riverfront cabana, complete with a resident family of hippos that woke us up each morning with their version of a rooster's call at dawn.



Many of the people in the area still gather water from the river each day, and do their laundry and personal washing in the river water. One of the reasons why hippos are so feared is that they consider the water their territory, so when people are using the river bank, they have to constantly be on guard.



another reason why using river water is dangerous



Our last few moments before heading back to camp from our boat safari. Boat safaris contain lots of hippos and birds, but we were most awed by the sunset.