Another few hours of driving, US$360, and a hefty mountain pass later, we found ourselves at the rim of the Ngorogoro Crater. Only 20kms wide one can see across it, and well, its just amazing. From the top, it is like staring down into the Garden of Eden, and one can see herds and herds of Buffalo, zebra, wildebeest, elephants and gazelle. Contrary to our initial ignorant thoughts, the crater has nothing to do with meteors or asteroids. Rather is is a volcanic land form, and apparently, or word on the street is that it was a massive volcanic mountain about the same size as Kilimanjaro. Its base was however full of volcanic vents and eventually the mountain collapsed in on itself creating a massive basin. It truly is one of the most amazing places i have ever been to, and i think we all agree, that it is somewhere we will all visit again some day!
We also spent a night camping inside the reserve - on the crater's rim. Initially we thought that most of the game was inside the crater, but we took a small night drive on which we saw lion twice, hyenas, elephants, Buffalo, and a massive herd of spring hares (kept us guessing for quite a while). And since the Tanzanians are about as keen on game fences as the Kenyans, we had a fairly entertaining night of camping. First a Buffalo interrupted washing dishes, then bush-pigs attacked our food crate, and later hyenas bit holes into our beers :)
