June 5, 2008I had a great opportunity to experience the natural beauty of Tanzania. Bright and early, myself, Jane, Leah, Shauna and two professional photographers (Adrian and Fritz), piled into a safari van and headed off to a nearby national park. Holy crap. Our impromptu safari turned out to be yet another one of the many highlights of the trip. We saw wildebeasts, antelope, baboons, monkeys, giraffes and some crazy bird things up close and wild. It's one thing to see all of those animals at the zoo (as I had a few weeks earlier in San Diego), but quite another to see them in their natural habitat and interacting. Fritz proclaimed himself 'Art Director', telling the driver where to stop so as to get the perfect framing for our respective cameras. Our guide took us to the rim of the Ngurdoto crater, which is miles across and full of jungle, due to the rich volcanic soil.
We spend the rest of the day driving around searching for an elusive elephant (never found it) and eating bananas. Oh the bananas. We bought them from a old man on the side of the road, who stood up from his stand, walked to the banana tree behind him, and picked fresh, tree-ripened bananas for us. Best fruit I've EVER tasted.That night we had our last reception, which was basically an opportunity for summit delegates to drink, eat, and schmooze. It seemed most attendees were anxious to live it up, being the last night in Tanzania. We nabbed a quick interview with Chris Tucker and our friend Shauna before deciding that was enough filming, there was much fun to be had.
