Saturday – April 26, 2025
Actually, don’t try this ANYWHERE unless you are a giraffe! The featured image shows a Rothschild giraffe eating leaves from an acacia tree. There are several reasons you don’t want to try that. 1) You can’t reach 15 feet in the air to get the leaves; 2) You don’t want to try and avoid the 3″ thorns that grow on the acacia tree and surround the leaves; 3) You can order acacia produce at your local earth-friendly grocer! Giraffes have a long, tough tongue that enables them to eat these leaves without damage to their bodies. Since there are many other herbivores competing for the available vegetation, being able to eat something located over 10 feet from the ground assures the giraffes will have a source of food. However, if an elephant wants the leaves, they don’t have to reach high – they can just push the tree over and eat from it while it is on the ground. At Bandia Reserve we didn’t see any elephants so I believe the giraffes can rest easy.
The choices of excursions in Dakar was limited. We were eligible for the city tour as a part of our cruise package but we had taken enough city tours to know they don’t really let you get into whatever area you are visiting. We switched to an excursion to Bandia Reserve which features non-predators from Africa. The don’t really have any indigenous animals in the part but those do represent many found in East Africa. We knew ahead of time we wouldn’t see lions, leopards, cheetahs, hippos and some of the other smaller animals.
The drive to the reserve was about an hour. On the way we were able to view living conditions as we traveled from the inner city to the country. From what we could see, many of those in Dakar are living in poverty and conditions worse that we have seen anywhere in the United States. You could see that the streets in the city were not paved but were dirt. Buildings all along our route were unfinished or abandoned. When we passed people in towns their businesses and homes were worse than those we had seen in other ports we visited on this cruise. Didn’t really get a chance to talk with residents to determine how they felt about life in Senegal so I can’t comment on their view of their conditions.
The info we had read about the safari we would take at Bandia made it sound like we would be in Jeeps seating 6. I didn’t see any Jeeps and the vehicles that were used had differing seating capacities. You’ll see photos and video of the vehicles used. Ours had room for 6-8 in the back (was a pickup truck) and 3 in the cab – 1 in the front seat with the driver and 2 in the second seat. I was fortunate to get the seat in front – Jan and Kelsey sat I the back with our guide next to them. (Jan told me she asked lots of questions.) There were no passengers in the second seat of the cab.
The vehicles were let into the park with enough spacing so we wouldn’t be photographing them but would be photographing the animals. First animal we saw was actually in a confined area – a couple tortoises. Next up was a male ostrich that wanted to get from one side of the road to the other. We saw a harem of impala but no buck. Next were patas monkeys with babies, a variety of monkeys with ostrich.
We began to see some of the bigger game – Rothschild giraffe, Burchell’s zebra, black rhinoceros, tourists and derby eland. At little further on we saw several warthogs checking the area for food. Further down the road was a group of giraffes eating from acacia trees (see first paragraph above). Rounding the road from them was a herd of savannah buffalo resting in the shade.
We stopped at a baobab tree that was said to be 1,000 years old. It had a sign “Tombeau de Griots”. Click the link for an explanation of that. By the way, I wasn’t expecting to see biobab trees in Senegal. I always thought of Madagascar as the home of these unusual trees but it turns out they are scattered in Africa as well. You’ll see several photos in today’s media of the trees. They did not have their leaves when we visited so they look dead – but they aren’t.
We headed down the road to the park entrance, restaurant and gift shop. There is a pond near that area and the pond is home to another larger animal – crocodiles! And there were plenty of them! By and informal count by Kelsey and I we saw 40 at one time on land and in the water. They ranged in size from 18″ to 7 or 8 feet. While I was photographing the crocs I noticed a couple vervet monkeys in a tree next to the outdoor eating area of the restaurant. Faster than I could take a photo one of the monkeys jumped on the table, grabbed 2 bananas from a man beginning to eat his lunch and run away with the fruit.
I took a step back to see if I could get a photo. Unfortunately, where I put my foot there was no ground at that level. I lost my balance, didn’t have anything to grab and fell backwards. I’m glad I was wearing a backpack with a towel wrapped around another lens for the camera because that cushioned my impact – but not enough for my left leg, right elbow or left shoulder. I couldn’t see the damage but Jan said it was ugly – skin had been ripped especially from my leg. We went to the bus and someone found alcohol wipes to clean my leg. Let me tell you – alcohol on bare raw skin is not a pleasant feeling! Jan filled out an incident report as we drove back to the ship.
When we reached the dock we spent some time looking at the merchandise for sale. Lots of carved wood and paintings (which we didn’t want because they would be hard to pack). Jan and I found t-shirts with Senegal and Dakar on them and Kelsey found a colorful dress.
There is a sail away time lapse for today and a photo of Kelsey dinner selection. The entertainment tonight was a couple things – first was a video put together by the Magnifica photo staff of night activities during the cruise. Following that was a variety show put on by the cruise staff. They did lots of fun things. It was nice to see all of them at one time. Most of the staff are those who assist with the World Cruise games. After the variety show Kelsey had her picture taken with Francesca – the girl who works with the Air team.
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