Seronera, Serengeti. August 2016

It's a little puddle of water in Seronera- Serengeti, downstream from the Yellow Bark Acacia where the Marabu storks gather for their overnight stay. Anyone who's been in Serengeti more than ones can recognize the place even without knowing its real name.
It's a little puddle of water, or so I thought while passing near every single safari in Serengeti. Little did I know about its depth.

In a normal year this time in August I should be guiding in Kenya. But the security situation in Kenya and the travel warning that we have in Israel over it, brought me to Tanzania with an excellent team of Matembezi driver guides and an excellent group of clients from Geographical Tours.

In a normal year this time in August I should be driving along the Mara river, looking for crossings of Gnus and Zebras over the river. Looking for exactly what Serengeti has offered us in one unbelievable morning of safari.  

It's a tricky season in Serengeti. It's very dry and dusty and the big migration of Gnus and Zebras are up north by the Kenyan border or beyond it in Masai Mara. We were almost tempted to go there but we didn't think our group would appreciate the long drive so we stayed in central Serengeti, knowing we shell at least see a lot of cats.
We had already spent quite a long time with a friendly Cheetah early morning and a group of Hippos that were trying hard to keep themselves wet in their poor pool, when we came by this puddle of water and we only stopped to watch the Zebras drinking.

One young Zebra looked as if it was stuck in the mud and in the beginning it looked like the rest of the Zebras with their fear ad excitement pushed it deeper into the mud. But it wasn't mud at all. The real reason jumped out of the water to try and pull the Zebra deeper.

Only when realizing the full size of the Crock did I realized the depth of the water and of what we are about to capture in our cameras. A rare opportunity in did. I had lived for almost 6 years by the most busy crossing point over the Mara River and I had never seen something like this.

 

 

 

 

And then the water was quiet for a while and we started to realize what we had just witnessed.

Every kill I ever saw and defiantly this one, reminds me of something I once read that can explain exactly how it feels to watch the full process.

It was as amazing and horrible as watching a snail crawling on the harp side of the knife.