2-20-11 (very LONG Blog post)
Mudsocks and very stuck jeep
Mudsocks and very stuck jeep
Lion's fresh paw print in the mudYesterday we had a Wildlife Management field exercise where we went to the Tarangire National Park in Tanzania. It was to be a typical safari with all of us in jeeps doing animal count transects throughout the park and meeting up at the lodge to eat at the buffet and go swimming. At least that was the plan… My jeep, now nicknamed Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, with Allie, Emily, Sarah, Luke, Amanda, Christina, Austin and I driven by Wilson and accompanied by our Wildlife Management teacher Frank, had other ideas. We left our field site at 7am and after a two hour drive we arrived at Tarangire. It was a beautiful day, and since it was so early in the morning it wasn’t too hot. We took a bathroom break and then set off in different directions in our jeeps. Five minutes in, after spotting Impala, ostrich, warthogs and cattle our road turned into swampland. We managed to barely squeeze through the first swampy section and technically we were stuck for ten seconds but it wasn’t bad and we kept on driving.
The way the transects were supposed to work was that there was a recorder who wrote down everything we saw, a GPS person to take the point where we saw them, a rangefinder to determine the distance from the jeep and everyone else was required to look for the animals with our binoculars. It was rather complicated in the beginning and I would say the first 20 minutes were purely devoted to getting the hang of it. But then we came to a part of the road that the rains had turned into a river. There was a current and everything. Frank hopped out with Wilson and they hiked up their shorts to walk through this river and see how deep it was. They found a stick and walked straight through it to the other side with the water rising up to Frank’s mid-thigh. For some reason that meant that we are able to go through it and so they hopped back into the car and we drove straight through it. It was very bumpy and the water was very high but we did it, cheered and kept driving.
Less than five minutes later we came to a part of the road that looked like a pond. There were reeds and everything, it was ridiculous, but it didn’t look as deep as the river we had just traversed so we went ahead and plowed straight through it. Or at least that was a goal. Half way through the muddy pond that used to be a road our engine stalled and we got stuck. Frank and Wilson get out again and for forty minutes they tried to get us unstuck while refusing to let us out of the car to help. They wandered off in search of logs and rocks after they realized our wench (I don’t know how to spell that, the thing that is attached to the car and you can attach it to a tree or another car to pull you out of a sticky situation) was broken and useless. Frank in his wandering found a water buffalo skull and held it up to his head as we laughed and took pictures. One log that Wilson found had three yellow scorpions on them, it was crazy. And to point it out to us he stuck his head right next to it and pointed, totally captured that moment with a photo as we were all freaking out. Since we were stuck in the car waiting we all decided to eat our lunches. My family should be proud, not only did I pack a PB&J sandwich but I ate the whole thing AND I LIKED IT!! It could be because the peanut butter here is very different tasting than in America, at least according to everyone here. I have no idea since as everybody knows, especially Patrick, I HATE peanut butter. But ever since Margret got lost I’ve decided to be prepared for any situation and that means assuming I won’t get to eat the nice lodge food or will want a snack before lunch. So we all ate our sandwiches and were talking and laughing, but after an hour we realized the situation was not changing and that we were still really stuck.
The way the transects were supposed to work was that there was a recorder who wrote down everything we saw, a GPS person to take the point where we saw them, a rangefinder to determine the distance from the jeep and everyone else was required to look for the animals with our binoculars. It was rather complicated in the beginning and I would say the first 20 minutes were purely devoted to getting the hang of it. But then we came to a part of the road that the rains had turned into a river. There was a current and everything. Frank hopped out with Wilson and they hiked up their shorts to walk through this river and see how deep it was. They found a stick and walked straight through it to the other side with the water rising up to Frank’s mid-thigh. For some reason that meant that we are able to go through it and so they hopped back into the car and we drove straight through it. It was very bumpy and the water was very high but we did it, cheered and kept driving.
Less than five minutes later we came to a part of the road that looked like a pond. There were reeds and everything, it was ridiculous, but it didn’t look as deep as the river we had just traversed so we went ahead and plowed straight through it. Or at least that was a goal. Half way through the muddy pond that used to be a road our engine stalled and we got stuck. Frank and Wilson get out again and for forty minutes they tried to get us unstuck while refusing to let us out of the car to help. They wandered off in search of logs and rocks after they realized our wench (I don’t know how to spell that, the thing that is attached to the car and you can attach it to a tree or another car to pull you out of a sticky situation) was broken and useless. Frank in his wandering found a water buffalo skull and held it up to his head as we laughed and took pictures. One log that Wilson found had three yellow scorpions on them, it was crazy. And to point it out to us he stuck his head right next to it and pointed, totally captured that moment with a photo as we were all freaking out. Since we were stuck in the car waiting we all decided to eat our lunches. My family should be proud, not only did I pack a PB&J sandwich but I ate the whole thing AND I LIKED IT!! It could be because the peanut butter here is very different tasting than in America, at least according to everyone here. I have no idea since as everybody knows, especially Patrick, I HATE peanut butter. But ever since Margret got lost I’ve decided to be prepared for any situation and that means assuming I won’t get to eat the nice lodge food or will want a snack before lunch. So we all ate our sandwiches and were talking and laughing, but after an hour we realized the situation was not changing and that we were still really stuck.
Keep in mind this is only 10am and we’ve only gone 3km away from the main gate. We had all finished eating and by this time we were really pestering Frank and Wilson to let us out of the car, even though Amanda and I were freaking out because that meant we were going to have to wade through African water and mud. Literally every conversation I had with people about Africa before actually coming here including my nurse mother, and the travel clinic doctor was DO NOT go in the local water nor drink it… and here I am begging Frank and Wilson to let us out to help. We didn’t know if there were snakes or dangerous parasites in this water but we knew we weren’t going anywhere unless we got out. It also was extremely aggravating to be stuck in the car while Frank and Wilson were drenched in sweat struggling to get the jeep unstuck. We felt like typical tourist Wazungus (plural of mzungus, white people) and none of us liked that feeling. Finally Frank lets us get out of the car but since it was so muddy he told us not to wear our shoes. When on safari we typically wear flip flops because we won’t (slash not allowed) be getting out of the car and we can’t stand on the seats with shoes on so it makes sense to wear shoes you can easily take off. Amanda and I are the first to get out of the car and we couldn’t be more disgusted. We step out and literally sink into oozing mud with sticks, rocks and god knows what else in it. We moved as fast as possible to dry land where we promptly started comparing muddy limbs and panicking at the possibility of getting Giardia ( probably misspelled: a horrible bacteria that gives you faucet diarrhea when contaminated water is ingested. In the first week Erica freaked us out about it during the medical health lecture and when you have it you smell like sulfur or rotten eggs. Basically anytime I have a stomach ache I think I have it because she told us we would probably get it at some point, the symptoms don’t show for a week so I’ll let you know next Saturday if I’m ok or not). UPDATE: NO Giardia!!
Anyways, the only person truly enjoying the mud was Austin who walks around barefoot at the field site all the time. After ten minutes of getting used to the mud and realizing we are outside in a national park in AFRICA, Frank and Wilson finally let us help by telling us to search for rocks to pile under the tires so we had some traction in the mud. Of course the nearest rocks were right next to a tree surrounded by an ant hill with really freaking HUGE ants. By this point my feet were caked in mud so if the ants bit me I didn’t feel it, but they definitely were crawling all over my feet and legs. That is of course when Christina decides it is a good idea to tell us about the ants that will kill a baby if it is left unattended. She is a future vet and watches too much animal planet and discovery channel for her own good. It wasn’t until later when she decided to mention the parasite that burrows into your porous skin, gets into your blood stream and slowly eats your brain… I’ll also keep you updated on that one.
We gather a bunch of rocks and hand them to Wilson and Frank, who won’t let us stand near the jeep, and then they decide that even though the wench is broken we could still pull on the rope/cord thingy so we line up and start to pull. Talk about the best tug-of-war ever, where there is an actual point to it as Allie funnily pointed out. Wilson gets in the jeep starts the engine and as he hits the gas we all pulled. It was a lot of work but one minute later the car squelched free and we scrambled to get out of his way. That is when Luke scratched his hand on the wench rope because it is rope with metal so that it can pull a car. Even though it was really tiny we all freaked out at the possibility of infection so Amanda, Christina and I immediately took over and we sterilized it with Christina’s first aid kit. Then we put enough Neosporin on it to treat a bullet wound (Austin’s words not mine) and bandaged it then wrapped his clean handkerchief around his hand to protect it. We then sort of wash the mud off ourselves in the mostly water part of the road, Frank reassured us that there are no water snakes in this region because it is normally very dry, and we piled back into the jeep immediately in search of our baby wipes and purel.
Off we go, we were enjoying the scenery, but noticed a strange lack of animals. We saw four dik diks (really tiny and cute antelope that are all over this area, they are monogamous and spend their entire lives with one partner. Also they are very nutritious and the locals will hunt them for bushmeat, even though they are as small as my miniature poodle), but NO other animals. It was very odd, especially after the abundance of animals near the gate. So our animal count transect was preceding very slowly. We get to an intersection and we follow the sign that says Safari Lodge, which is our destination for lunch. By this point it is 11:30am, we have to be at the lodge by noon, but since we were stuck for so long we were very far away and it was going to take us over an hour to get there. So Frank calls Erica to update her and let her know we were going to be late. We turn right onto the road to the lodge and the scenery goes from open woodland to huge bushland and grassland (yes there is a difference), it looked exactly like Lion King would look like if it wasn’t animated. Complete with baobao trees, the really large and old trees that dwarf even elephants, and the tree that the wise baboon from Lion King lives in. Right as I’m taking pictures we see another muddy part, this one looks even easier to drive through since there isn’t any water so we give it no thought. OF course we get stuck immediately, but even more stuck then we were in the pond.
After five minutes Frank and Wilson let us get out of the car to see if removing our weight will give us the power to get out, apparently our engine was starting to be messed up from water seeping into it while in the pond and we no longer had the power needed especially with all our weight. So we pile out and get a little muddy again, freaking out a little less and we go stand by the road sign. We turn around and see the jeep’s back right wheel completely sunk in mud; it looked like there was no wheel. And the back left wheel was halfway sunk. It looked impossible, even removing our weight did nothing. Then we go in search of stones and logs to help get us out a second time. Unfortunately we were not very good environmentalists; we broke some tree branches to get logs since there were none on the ground. It’s at this point that we start discussing the strange lack of animals. We had been aware that there was a threat of lions; we were outside in a national park and not in the jeep, with no guns for protection. But to make the connection that no animals meant we were in lion territory was surreal. We told ourselves that it wasn’t lion hunting time and that we were being really loud so any sane animal would have run away anyways and tried not to think about it. But we definitely didn’t wander far from the jeep and Frank had his eye on the surroundings the whole time. He studies lions when he isn’t teaching us so we knew he would be the one to spot them. Also if he wasn’t worried then we weren’t going to worry. When asked if there were lions he shrugged, typical African style, and said probably not.
We took a group shot by putting the camera on the sign, I’ll try to attach it but we have no internet so it may be too fragile for a photo upload. In the background is the jeep stuck in the mud. The stones and logs with some helpful pushing by the group worked and the car got unstuck. But the wheels spinning in the mud had caked Allie and Luke’s legs and shorts in mud. I escaped unscathed because I had flip flops on since it was very dry and thorny in some parts, but when I went to push the car I lost them in the mud as I started sinking. Of course the group decided to push while I’m struggling to pull my shoe out of the mud. I literally thought I would never get the shoe out of the mud and right as it popped out so did the car. We cheered took some muddy photos and piled back into the car. By this point we were all sweaty, beginning to be sunburnt and hungry so we munched on cookies, put on sunscreen and stood up to watch our surroundings. Then guess what should happen... we get stuck for the FOURTH time, only a km from the last place we got stuck. Its 12:30pm by now and the heat has become rather intense. Since we were in the grasslands there was no shade and when they let us pile out of the cars the water/mud was VERY hot! I felt like I was standing in a muddy hot tub, similar to a mudbath at a spa. We go again in search of logs and rocks, this time without having to be asked. After several horribly sounding tries to get the car unstuck Frank and Wilson came to the conclusion that it was time to use the wench rope again so they have Austin help them carry it and tie it around the nearest tree. The tree was very small and did NOT look sturdy enough but they tried it anyways. And the wench worked!!!! As it made a horrible cranking sound, with the tree slowly bending over, the car moved out of the mudhole it was stuck in and Wilson hit the gas to get it out of the mud even more. We cheered and clapped again, it seems to be our thing, LOL.
Anyways, the only person truly enjoying the mud was Austin who walks around barefoot at the field site all the time. After ten minutes of getting used to the mud and realizing we are outside in a national park in AFRICA, Frank and Wilson finally let us help by telling us to search for rocks to pile under the tires so we had some traction in the mud. Of course the nearest rocks were right next to a tree surrounded by an ant hill with really freaking HUGE ants. By this point my feet were caked in mud so if the ants bit me I didn’t feel it, but they definitely were crawling all over my feet and legs. That is of course when Christina decides it is a good idea to tell us about the ants that will kill a baby if it is left unattended. She is a future vet and watches too much animal planet and discovery channel for her own good. It wasn’t until later when she decided to mention the parasite that burrows into your porous skin, gets into your blood stream and slowly eats your brain… I’ll also keep you updated on that one.
We gather a bunch of rocks and hand them to Wilson and Frank, who won’t let us stand near the jeep, and then they decide that even though the wench is broken we could still pull on the rope/cord thingy so we line up and start to pull. Talk about the best tug-of-war ever, where there is an actual point to it as Allie funnily pointed out. Wilson gets in the jeep starts the engine and as he hits the gas we all pulled. It was a lot of work but one minute later the car squelched free and we scrambled to get out of his way. That is when Luke scratched his hand on the wench rope because it is rope with metal so that it can pull a car. Even though it was really tiny we all freaked out at the possibility of infection so Amanda, Christina and I immediately took over and we sterilized it with Christina’s first aid kit. Then we put enough Neosporin on it to treat a bullet wound (Austin’s words not mine) and bandaged it then wrapped his clean handkerchief around his hand to protect it. We then sort of wash the mud off ourselves in the mostly water part of the road, Frank reassured us that there are no water snakes in this region because it is normally very dry, and we piled back into the jeep immediately in search of our baby wipes and purel.
Off we go, we were enjoying the scenery, but noticed a strange lack of animals. We saw four dik diks (really tiny and cute antelope that are all over this area, they are monogamous and spend their entire lives with one partner. Also they are very nutritious and the locals will hunt them for bushmeat, even though they are as small as my miniature poodle), but NO other animals. It was very odd, especially after the abundance of animals near the gate. So our animal count transect was preceding very slowly. We get to an intersection and we follow the sign that says Safari Lodge, which is our destination for lunch. By this point it is 11:30am, we have to be at the lodge by noon, but since we were stuck for so long we were very far away and it was going to take us over an hour to get there. So Frank calls Erica to update her and let her know we were going to be late. We turn right onto the road to the lodge and the scenery goes from open woodland to huge bushland and grassland (yes there is a difference), it looked exactly like Lion King would look like if it wasn’t animated. Complete with baobao trees, the really large and old trees that dwarf even elephants, and the tree that the wise baboon from Lion King lives in. Right as I’m taking pictures we see another muddy part, this one looks even easier to drive through since there isn’t any water so we give it no thought. OF course we get stuck immediately, but even more stuck then we were in the pond.
After five minutes Frank and Wilson let us get out of the car to see if removing our weight will give us the power to get out, apparently our engine was starting to be messed up from water seeping into it while in the pond and we no longer had the power needed especially with all our weight. So we pile out and get a little muddy again, freaking out a little less and we go stand by the road sign. We turn around and see the jeep’s back right wheel completely sunk in mud; it looked like there was no wheel. And the back left wheel was halfway sunk. It looked impossible, even removing our weight did nothing. Then we go in search of stones and logs to help get us out a second time. Unfortunately we were not very good environmentalists; we broke some tree branches to get logs since there were none on the ground. It’s at this point that we start discussing the strange lack of animals. We had been aware that there was a threat of lions; we were outside in a national park and not in the jeep, with no guns for protection. But to make the connection that no animals meant we were in lion territory was surreal. We told ourselves that it wasn’t lion hunting time and that we were being really loud so any sane animal would have run away anyways and tried not to think about it. But we definitely didn’t wander far from the jeep and Frank had his eye on the surroundings the whole time. He studies lions when he isn’t teaching us so we knew he would be the one to spot them. Also if he wasn’t worried then we weren’t going to worry. When asked if there were lions he shrugged, typical African style, and said probably not.
We took a group shot by putting the camera on the sign, I’ll try to attach it but we have no internet so it may be too fragile for a photo upload. In the background is the jeep stuck in the mud. The stones and logs with some helpful pushing by the group worked and the car got unstuck. But the wheels spinning in the mud had caked Allie and Luke’s legs and shorts in mud. I escaped unscathed because I had flip flops on since it was very dry and thorny in some parts, but when I went to push the car I lost them in the mud as I started sinking. Of course the group decided to push while I’m struggling to pull my shoe out of the mud. I literally thought I would never get the shoe out of the mud and right as it popped out so did the car. We cheered took some muddy photos and piled back into the car. By this point we were all sweaty, beginning to be sunburnt and hungry so we munched on cookies, put on sunscreen and stood up to watch our surroundings. Then guess what should happen... we get stuck for the FOURTH time, only a km from the last place we got stuck. Its 12:30pm by now and the heat has become rather intense. Since we were in the grasslands there was no shade and when they let us pile out of the cars the water/mud was VERY hot! I felt like I was standing in a muddy hot tub, similar to a mudbath at a spa. We go again in search of logs and rocks, this time without having to be asked. After several horribly sounding tries to get the car unstuck Frank and Wilson came to the conclusion that it was time to use the wench rope again so they have Austin help them carry it and tie it around the nearest tree. The tree was very small and did NOT look sturdy enough but they tried it anyways. And the wench worked!!!! As it made a horrible cranking sound, with the tree slowly bending over, the car moved out of the mudhole it was stuck in and Wilson hit the gas to get it out of the mud even more. We cheered and clapped again, it seems to be our thing, LOL.
We all hop into the car again and by this point we have the drill down. The order was Allie, Austin, Sarah, then Emily and Luke and finally Christina, me and Amanda. The way our jeep works is that there are 11 seats in total. Three in the way back, two in the middle back, three in the middle and finally three front seats including the driver. In order to get to the middle back and back seats one of the middle seats has to be lifted. This requires someone to reach under the seat and pull a metal (that is pointy) lever towards them while moving the seat up. At first it is difficult but let’s just say Amanda and I have got it down by now. So to get out of the car, Christina gets out on her side, Amanda opens her side’s door and gets out with me following. Then I turn around, lift her backpack out of the way of the seat and place it on my middle seat and one of us lifts the chair up. Then Luke gets out, followed by Emily, Sarah, and Allie. Austin just hops over the side of the jeep since the hatches on the roof are open for the safari. Wilson was our driver and Frank in the front passenger seat. While driving once again and literally praying that we wouldn’t get stuck again, we sprayed ourselves with bug spray since the flies were incessantly bothering us. Not only do their bites hurt, but we have the risk of Titsi flies. They are flies that carry African sleeping sickness and any bite from them gives you the risk of getting that horrible disease. Just one more worry we all had LOL.
As we were driving we still saw no animals and we realized we hadn’t seen ANY humans for the entire time we had been out. There were clearly tire tracks and a definite road in front of us, but no animals nor humans anywhere in sight. But the scenery was unreal, with a bright endlessly blue sky above us. While we were driving every time we saw mud or water we would freak out and it is at this point that we began offroading out of necessity. Offroading is when you go off the road (DUH), but it is one of the most despicable things you can do in the park. Not only is it illegal but you are destroying habitat, possibly stressing animals and it is very easy to get lost. Usually poachers or stupid tourists are the ones who offroad. If we hadn’t of had these extenuating circumstances we NEVER would have done it. But we had two options: go through a swamp/river that used to be the road or offroad occasionally to go around it. Our only goal was to get to the lodge, our animal counting transects completely abandoned. The group not stuck in our jeep intended to stay at the lodge till 3pm so that they could eat and go swimming. God did swimming sound like a dream. We were all hot, sweaty, muddy and exhausted. Jumping in a pool would have been amazing.
As we were driving we still saw no animals and we realized we hadn’t seen ANY humans for the entire time we had been out. There were clearly tire tracks and a definite road in front of us, but no animals nor humans anywhere in sight. But the scenery was unreal, with a bright endlessly blue sky above us. While we were driving every time we saw mud or water we would freak out and it is at this point that we began offroading out of necessity. Offroading is when you go off the road (DUH), but it is one of the most despicable things you can do in the park. Not only is it illegal but you are destroying habitat, possibly stressing animals and it is very easy to get lost. Usually poachers or stupid tourists are the ones who offroad. If we hadn’t of had these extenuating circumstances we NEVER would have done it. But we had two options: go through a swamp/river that used to be the road or offroad occasionally to go around it. Our only goal was to get to the lodge, our animal counting transects completely abandoned. The group not stuck in our jeep intended to stay at the lodge till 3pm so that they could eat and go swimming. God did swimming sound like a dream. We were all hot, sweaty, muddy and exhausted. Jumping in a pool would have been amazing.
I don’t really remember all the details of the next 7 times we got stuck, but all of them were epic. Some were easy, we just hopped out and Wilson drove out of the mud, others we had to push and pull for a while. We developed a routine of if we saw too much mud/water in the road up ahead we would get out and Wilson would drive to the next dry spot with us walking on foot behind him. Otherwise I’m sure we would have been stuck a hundred more times. We walked in so much mud that it looked like we had mud socks, thus prompting the title and nickname for our group. It was between our toes and when we scraped it off it made no difference, the mud was never ending. And I couldn’t wear my flip flops because that made it harder to walk since the mud made them so heavy and I didn’t want to lose them. The landscape was changing between bushland and grassland, but there were still no animals in the region. We saw a herd of cattle in the distance, on the Maasai lands bordering the park, but nothing else. We saw LOTS of bones and at one time an entire elephant carcass. People asked why we didn’t turn around or call for help. We did all of those things, we tried different roads, but each one was worse than the last, and we knew we couldn’t turn around because we would get stuck again, maybe even worse. It was better to keep forging towards the lodge. Wilson and Frank called constantly on the radio and the cell-phones but nothing was really getting through, or they would call right after we got unstuck to say we were on the way so the seriousness wasn’t fully expressed. Frank had told us earlier on that one time he and his students, different program, were stuck till midnight. We had all laughed at 11am, but by 3:30pm we started rationing food in case we had to spend the night. We had MORE than enough water since the jeeps always carry extra kegs of it. And luckily my jeep group could NOT have been better. We worked really well together, no one got annoyed with one another and we all had a great sense of humor about the whole thing. There was neither whining nor rudeness, we just were having fun. It’s also really satisfying when you get unstuck from the mud and the whole group breaks into applause and cheering out of sheer happiness. And our adrenaline never let up, we were constantly in a state of emergency because we were so constantly getting stuck.
We came to another fork in the road with one direction towards the lodge and another to the main gate, since it was after 3pm we decided to head to the gate. I say we, but the students had no say, it was Frank and Wilson with their experience who were making decisions and honestly our input was gently ignored. I feel I should also say that Wilson was an amazing driver with Frank giving great instructions and they really were watching out for our safety. Nothing that happened was their fault or ours. It is impossible to predict what will happen in the field, as seen on Valentine’s Day when Margret got lost and all of us handled it as best we could. You would think by this point my story ends and we find a dry road and drive to safety, but nope. The 12th time we got stuck was the worst we had ever been stuck. The road was literally covered in water and mud with completely dry grassland on either side. And Wilson had driven off ahead of us to try and avoid getting stuck and he still got stuck, but this time with the car slowly sinking into the mud. The situation was much more serious because it seemed there was no way out. On the walk to the clearly sinking car, what did we discover but lion paw prints. A whole pride (group of female lions) of them, and very fresh!! The last time we had gotten stuck Frank had pointed out a lion paw print that was no more than 2 hours old and the road had kind of looped us around so that we were parallel to that spot so we knew these tracks were even more fresh than the ones before. When asked: Frank shrugged, very infuriating when Africans do that, and said they could be close but probably not. None of us believed him and we all started watching the clock because prime lion hunting starts at 5pm which at the rate we were going was really close. It also gets dark around 6pm so Frank and Wilson kept yelling TWENDE (let’s go) at us every time we weren’t in the jeep. All of us were much more alert about our surroundings, but when you are walking in mud up to your knees it’s almost impossible not to be looking at your feet. I always thought it was so crazy how lions could sneak up on their prey unnoticed but being at their height surrounded by grass taller than me and knowing they are the same color as the grass… They could have been right next to me and I would have had no idea. Of course Luke and Austin thought it was hilarious to mention that as the smallest I look like the baby of the herd and I’d probably be their target, well that sure sped me up. None of us let anyone lag behind because we were feeling so paranoid, but we weren’t really paying that much attention. After over 6 hours of getting in and out of the jeep, it becomes a lot easier to let your guard down because you become accustomed to your surroundings.
We came to another fork in the road with one direction towards the lodge and another to the main gate, since it was after 3pm we decided to head to the gate. I say we, but the students had no say, it was Frank and Wilson with their experience who were making decisions and honestly our input was gently ignored. I feel I should also say that Wilson was an amazing driver with Frank giving great instructions and they really were watching out for our safety. Nothing that happened was their fault or ours. It is impossible to predict what will happen in the field, as seen on Valentine’s Day when Margret got lost and all of us handled it as best we could. You would think by this point my story ends and we find a dry road and drive to safety, but nope. The 12th time we got stuck was the worst we had ever been stuck. The road was literally covered in water and mud with completely dry grassland on either side. And Wilson had driven off ahead of us to try and avoid getting stuck and he still got stuck, but this time with the car slowly sinking into the mud. The situation was much more serious because it seemed there was no way out. On the walk to the clearly sinking car, what did we discover but lion paw prints. A whole pride (group of female lions) of them, and very fresh!! The last time we had gotten stuck Frank had pointed out a lion paw print that was no more than 2 hours old and the road had kind of looped us around so that we were parallel to that spot so we knew these tracks were even more fresh than the ones before. When asked: Frank shrugged, very infuriating when Africans do that, and said they could be close but probably not. None of us believed him and we all started watching the clock because prime lion hunting starts at 5pm which at the rate we were going was really close. It also gets dark around 6pm so Frank and Wilson kept yelling TWENDE (let’s go) at us every time we weren’t in the jeep. All of us were much more alert about our surroundings, but when you are walking in mud up to your knees it’s almost impossible not to be looking at your feet. I always thought it was so crazy how lions could sneak up on their prey unnoticed but being at their height surrounded by grass taller than me and knowing they are the same color as the grass… They could have been right next to me and I would have had no idea. Of course Luke and Austin thought it was hilarious to mention that as the smallest I look like the baby of the herd and I’d probably be their target, well that sure sped me up. None of us let anyone lag behind because we were feeling so paranoid, but we weren’t really paying that much attention. After over 6 hours of getting in and out of the jeep, it becomes a lot easier to let your guard down because you become accustomed to your surroundings.
While walking in the mud I felt a sharp pain in my heel, I looked down, peeled the mud off my feet to see a thorn in my callous. I left it in there partly because it was stuck in there good and also because I thought it would be worse to have an open wound while walking in that mud with god knows what in the water. The entire trip the mud was much more than just mud, there were these rocks everywhere and after Austin examined one we realized it was flint. Again one of my thoughts was blasted apart. I had always thought that whoever discovered fire was a bit of a genius to have found the flint stones and smash them together to start fire. Well now I think even a caveman could have done it. Flint stones are EVERYWHERE as my feet are well aware now, I picked up a small piece as a memento (I know bad environmentalist again, but I felt I had earned it after they scratched me). The first humans would have been stupid to not figure it out; they probably accidentally dropped a flint stone on another flint stone and started a fire, thus giving them the knowledge of how to start a fire. It definitely wasn’t a genius who figured that one out.
Anyways, back to our slowly sinking jeep in the muddy road. After struggling for five minutes they knew this was much more serious than all the other times, so they called Erica and told them where we were and that we needed to be pulled out. Except that the technology wasn’t working and even though they were both on the phone and the radio no one knew where we were. I kept hearing una toka wapi on the radio over and over again, which is Swahili for where are you? By this time we were sitting down in the mud while Frank and Wilson tried to solve our problem and contact Erica. This is not to imply that we hadn’t been pushing or pulling the car this entire time. We even tried lifting it and nothing was working. We were also acting delirious from so much sun and slight dehydration even though we had been drinking tons of water and were well fed. So we finally just collapsed in the mud and hoped a lion wasn’t anywhere near us. After 30 minutes we received radio contact that one of our other jeeps and the lodge owner were on their way to pick us up. But ten minutes after that we received news that they had gotten close but turned around to find another road less muddy but all the roads towards us were horribly muddy conditions. Upon hearing that our group surged together determined to get the car out of this mud. We laughed at the ridiculousness of our being stuck. We were so thoroughly stuck that no one could get to us. We made jokes that we would need a helicopter to rescue us; every joke has some truth behind it and let’s just say the joke wasn’t that funny. If you looked up you could see storm clouds and for the past half hour we had been hearing thunder. There was an interesting debate about whether the sound was a lion roar or thunder, but Frank settled that by saying it was thunder. We knew that if it rained our car would not only be sinking but would start filling with water.
Miraculously and I honestly don’t know how we did it but we pulled, pushed and literally LIFTED the 4 ton jeep out of the mud and Wilson sped off. We all cheered, once again, and started following the jeep. By now every single person but Christina and I had been completely covered in mud by the wheels. And don’t you dare even hint that we didn’t work as hard as everyone else, we just were pulling the rope or immediately behind the jeep so the spray didn’t reach us. Pulling the rope was dangerous because Wilson would rev the engine and turn the wheels side to side in an attempt to get free of the mud so being in front of the vehicle pulling the wench was very dangerous and every time we had to jump out of his way. Now it’s after 5pm, lion hunting time, and we can see storm clouds converging overhead from either side so when Frank calmly yelled TWENDE we ran to the jeep with Wilson waving his arms at us to hurry. We get to the jeep and hop in and we come to another intersection with a sign that has two different ways to get to the main gate. Frank and Wilson pick the drier looking one and speed off. The unfortunate thing that we discovered was that even though the road looks dry, that doesn’t mean it is. The sun had merely caked the top part dry, but it was still very much wet underneath it. After three more times of being very stuck but pushing the car out of the mud we passed the same intersection where we had gotten stuck the third time, except with the help of our already perfectly placed rocks and logs we managed to breeze through it, and it helped once we got out of the vehicle.
Anyways, back to our slowly sinking jeep in the muddy road. After struggling for five minutes they knew this was much more serious than all the other times, so they called Erica and told them where we were and that we needed to be pulled out. Except that the technology wasn’t working and even though they were both on the phone and the radio no one knew where we were. I kept hearing una toka wapi on the radio over and over again, which is Swahili for where are you? By this time we were sitting down in the mud while Frank and Wilson tried to solve our problem and contact Erica. This is not to imply that we hadn’t been pushing or pulling the car this entire time. We even tried lifting it and nothing was working. We were also acting delirious from so much sun and slight dehydration even though we had been drinking tons of water and were well fed. So we finally just collapsed in the mud and hoped a lion wasn’t anywhere near us. After 30 minutes we received radio contact that one of our other jeeps and the lodge owner were on their way to pick us up. But ten minutes after that we received news that they had gotten close but turned around to find another road less muddy but all the roads towards us were horribly muddy conditions. Upon hearing that our group surged together determined to get the car out of this mud. We laughed at the ridiculousness of our being stuck. We were so thoroughly stuck that no one could get to us. We made jokes that we would need a helicopter to rescue us; every joke has some truth behind it and let’s just say the joke wasn’t that funny. If you looked up you could see storm clouds and for the past half hour we had been hearing thunder. There was an interesting debate about whether the sound was a lion roar or thunder, but Frank settled that by saying it was thunder. We knew that if it rained our car would not only be sinking but would start filling with water.
Miraculously and I honestly don’t know how we did it but we pulled, pushed and literally LIFTED the 4 ton jeep out of the mud and Wilson sped off. We all cheered, once again, and started following the jeep. By now every single person but Christina and I had been completely covered in mud by the wheels. And don’t you dare even hint that we didn’t work as hard as everyone else, we just were pulling the rope or immediately behind the jeep so the spray didn’t reach us. Pulling the rope was dangerous because Wilson would rev the engine and turn the wheels side to side in an attempt to get free of the mud so being in front of the vehicle pulling the wench was very dangerous and every time we had to jump out of his way. Now it’s after 5pm, lion hunting time, and we can see storm clouds converging overhead from either side so when Frank calmly yelled TWENDE we ran to the jeep with Wilson waving his arms at us to hurry. We get to the jeep and hop in and we come to another intersection with a sign that has two different ways to get to the main gate. Frank and Wilson pick the drier looking one and speed off. The unfortunate thing that we discovered was that even though the road looks dry, that doesn’t mean it is. The sun had merely caked the top part dry, but it was still very much wet underneath it. After three more times of being very stuck but pushing the car out of the mud we passed the same intersection where we had gotten stuck the third time, except with the help of our already perfectly placed rocks and logs we managed to breeze through it, and it helped once we got out of the vehicle.
Finally we get to the edge of the park and we can see the main gate far ahead in the distance, the Maasai are herding their cattle right next to the road, but straight ahead of us the road is literally a lake. Wilson tries to drive through it but realizes it is impossible so we reverse and offroad for a bit, but we came to another river of a road and hop out one more time. Wilson was supposed to offroad alongside us but decided that another part of the area looked drier and he disappeared around some trees with Frank yelling at him in Swahili. So we keep walking through the river, former road, with our feet covered in mud with no idea where Wilson or the jeep is. The sky at this point is filled with clouds and there is a beautiful fire rainbow. Austin explained to us that when a rainbow is next to the sun and it isn’t raining yet it is called a fire rainbow, well that was gorgeous and made the situation seem less dire. My favorite time of day is dusk/twilight right before it gets dark and everything has a golden halo around it from the dimming sun. Well that was what was happening, except not only is it getting dark in a national park, but we have NO idea where the jeep is. Frank leads us away from the river and towards where he heard Wilson shout, this is probably where the rest of my splinters came from. Stupid Whistling Thorn acacia tree! We get to the jeep, but he is on the other side of a former road, now river and has to cross it to get to us. He speeds up and crosses successfully but hydroplanes on the mud/water and zigzags into a tree… Not only is our jeep stuck in mud again but the top part of it had been completely dented by a tree branch. Wilson was totally fine, but Frank was livid, he started yelling at him in Swahili. I’m pretty sure the gist of it was about how stupid Wilson was and why did he go off in the wrong direction, etc… I’m sure with swear words, but seeing as I have a limited Swahili vocabulary I have no idea if he swore or not. He did NOT look happy and neither did Wilson. It’s literally on the verge of darkness and we were 3 km away from the main gate with no jeep. Frank yells at us to follow him and we start walking off in the direction of the main gate.
We grabbed our stuff out of the jeep as fast as possible, which took longer than it would have been if we hadn’t been doing physical labor all day, and scrambled after him. Wilson was sternly told by Frank to stay with the jeep and we headed off. 1/2 mile later we see a familiar jeep driving in our direction, its Moses and Charles (the engineer/mechanic who deals with all the cars), they yell at us to get in and zoom off towards the main gate. Of course the second we are in their jeep all the roads are perfectly dry and no mud or water in sight. We get to the main gate and are greeted by confused but happy fellow students. Erica looked so relieved until she realized Wilson wasn’t with us and neither was our jeep. Moses and Charles turned around with Frank and went to get them. Allie, Luke, Austin, Amanda, Emily, Christina, Sarah and I were left to explain ourselves to everyone. We must have looked quite a sight, completely covered in mud, I still was somehow very clean, and I later realized all the mud was on the inside of my clothes and not on the outside. One girl actually had the nerve to say I must not have done any work pushing the car since I was so clean, I can honestly say if I had been standing next to her I would have punched her in the face. We told some of our stories, this is the most complete version, but couldn’t even begin to convey everything that had happened to us. They had no idea what was going on, they thought we were lost the entire time. They asked us why we didn’t turn around and some questions that are just too stupid to repeat. We showed them pictures and hugged a bunch of people, but I don’t think they’ll ever understand, nor will you, what really went down out there in Tarangire. I can say that the 8 of us are closer than anyone here. It’s so crazy, we didn’t drive each other insane, we had a total blast and we worked our butts off to get to the main gate.
Thank god for Frank and Wilson. Of course once we got back we were told the seriousness of everything that happened. Not only is it illegal to walk in this national park, but we returned after 6pm which is normally heavily punished with a fine, and that the lion pride tracks we saw were probably 5 minutes old according to Frank. We were walking directly behind a lion pride; they were probably around us the whole time!! Frank said he didn’t want to freak us out and that lions don’t really eat people. Around noon we had seen five different groups of circling vultures in the distance and Frank told us that where we saw the prints we were directly underneath and between the vultures, probably stalking lion kills… There are a hundred things that could have gone wrong, we could have been injured, or bitten by a black mamba (very poisonous and very common snake here). He also decided to mention that no animals meant we were in lion territory and that every time we got out of the car we were in danger. Around 7pm Chitty Chitty Bang Bang was returned to us with Wilson, and we returned home. Charles drove though with Wilson inbetween him and Frank. Wilson got chewed out in Swahili, I really wish I could have understood everything that was said. Oh and did I mention we had to drive without one of the hatches on, very illegal, since the front one was so bent out of shape from the tree. And it started raining twenty minutes from camp. But the view of the sky and lightening was amazing right above me so it was worth it. The jeep is a piece of work, throughout the day the tires had been making whistling noises and something would smoke, definitely smelled burning rubber several times, the engine is probably fried and we almost ran out of gas on the way to Moyo Hill. But by 9pm we pulled into the camp and ate the most delicious dinner ever. Then the mudsocks had a mandatory 45minute foot soak in anti-septic with a debrief to Erica so she could write up a report. We also got an extension on our three papers for another two days, sweetness. Then showers and bed. I pulled the splinters out before I went to bed and coated my feet in Neosporin. I feel exhausted today but totally fine and I don’t want anyone to worry. I’m barely even sunburnt since I put so much sunscreen on, not even bug bites since I used bug spray, Luke on the other hand has a swollen face and ears from a bad sunburn. And I least got the thorns out of my feet, Frank had a total of 11 this morning still in. Sorry this is so long, but I wanted to write it all down before I forgot anything. Our medical professional said that since it had rained the night before the water was probably as safe as we could get and we should be fine. I’ll let you know if I get giardia. I really hope not!! And this adventure in no way reflects on my program here in Tanzania, everything that happened was the safest anyone could make and the most scared I actually felt was while driving at night with no street lights and dangerous drivers. Hakuna Matata!!
We grabbed our stuff out of the jeep as fast as possible, which took longer than it would have been if we hadn’t been doing physical labor all day, and scrambled after him. Wilson was sternly told by Frank to stay with the jeep and we headed off. 1/2 mile later we see a familiar jeep driving in our direction, its Moses and Charles (the engineer/mechanic who deals with all the cars), they yell at us to get in and zoom off towards the main gate. Of course the second we are in their jeep all the roads are perfectly dry and no mud or water in sight. We get to the main gate and are greeted by confused but happy fellow students. Erica looked so relieved until she realized Wilson wasn’t with us and neither was our jeep. Moses and Charles turned around with Frank and went to get them. Allie, Luke, Austin, Amanda, Emily, Christina, Sarah and I were left to explain ourselves to everyone. We must have looked quite a sight, completely covered in mud, I still was somehow very clean, and I later realized all the mud was on the inside of my clothes and not on the outside. One girl actually had the nerve to say I must not have done any work pushing the car since I was so clean, I can honestly say if I had been standing next to her I would have punched her in the face. We told some of our stories, this is the most complete version, but couldn’t even begin to convey everything that had happened to us. They had no idea what was going on, they thought we were lost the entire time. They asked us why we didn’t turn around and some questions that are just too stupid to repeat. We showed them pictures and hugged a bunch of people, but I don’t think they’ll ever understand, nor will you, what really went down out there in Tarangire. I can say that the 8 of us are closer than anyone here. It’s so crazy, we didn’t drive each other insane, we had a total blast and we worked our butts off to get to the main gate.
Much love and I honestly feel great,
Julie
P.S. we got stuck a total of 16 times, not counting the times we had to get out and walk behind the jeep.
P.P.S. BEST GROUP EVER. YAY mudsocks!!
