Dave Burns Photo Tours & Safaris

The Ngorongoro Crater is a special place and although we only had one and a half days there this Fall, it treated us well. The weather was cool and crisp in the mornings and sunny and warm midday.

We were off to a great start by coming upon a male lion and his cub almost immediately after descending the access road. Very difficult to photograph well since they were staying in the long grass. We saw a black rhino mother and her calf in the distance but they tend to avoid coming too close to the roads. Photographing them at such long distances is tough because, even though you have them in focus, you tend to get atmospheric refraction which gives you something like a “mirage” look.

At our picnic spot by the water, a bull elephant gave us a rare show by partially submerging himself and then swimming past the resident pod of hippo as he made his way to the soft grasses on the bank:

The rest of the day we saw plenty of other wildlife like baboons, hyena, zebra, and wildebeest. The following morning, as we crossed the Crater floor, we paused to watch a very large herd of buffalo coming down to a stream to drink:

Then, in late morning, we ascended the opposite side of the Crater and began our trip out to the Serengeti.

— Dave