After an impressive drive through the land of the Maasai, we reach a base where we have to register. The area around Lake Natron is also a national park and charges an entrance fee.

Since Gabriel has to request a government code over the telephone connection, we have to wait some time because the connection is not good.

Then we suddenly reach a green oasis in the middle of this barren desert. The green of the trees literally jumps into our faces. We have arrived at our lodge. This Garden of Eden in the middle of the desert is apparently fed with water from the mountains.

But I am surprised that there is no green plant to be seen away from the lodge, even though there are small Maasai villages everywhere.

We set up our tents before a Maasai man named Matis introduces himself to us. He is our guide for this area and will take us to Lake Natron and a nearby waterfall.

The view from the lodge in the evening is a wonderful way to end the day. Our personal chef has once again prepared something delicious for us and we brought our own cold beer.

First we drive to Lake Natron, for which we took a long detour. The lake is famous for its extremely pink colour in the dry season due to its high salt content and the algae that bloom in it.

We came at exactly the right time of year – but the wrong year. There is no trace of pink in the lake.

Matis explains that the lake has not been pink since 2019 because it has rained so much since that year that the water is too high to be discolored by the algae. The lake’s water level is so high that the normally very alkaline water is so diluted that fish already live there.

What a disappointment. Someone could have told us that earlier.

At least we see a lot of flamingos and pelicans. The latter have only recently started to feel at home here, as there are now fish.

The lake is the world’s largest breeding area for flamingos because the conditions are ideal. It remains to be seen whether this will remain the case.

The Masai Matis also leads us to a waterfall in a gorge. For this we have to make ourselves waterproof, because the path leads partly through the river, which is sometimes waist-high, and we have to climb a few passages.

This is not for the faint of heart. At least we can swim and shower under the Ngersero waterfall at the end.

I also did not expect this wet adventure in this wasteland

After a quiet night in the tent, we set off early – like every day at 5 a.m. – for Lake Natron.

The view of the birds was good yesterday too. The morning offers the view in pink. At least this means we finally get the impression of color that we have been missing at the lake so far.

In the morning the birds are usually closer to the shore and easier to observe, but they are shy and quickly fly away when we approach.

The world of flamingos is pink!

In the early morning, we can suddenly see a lot of animals in the savannah around Lake Natron. Here, a small herd of zebras trots along, there, a lonely wildebeest stomps through the countryside.

Then we even see a giraffe. Two giraffes! Three! Four! A whole family. What are they doing here? The animals are hardly shy and we can

We stop at a small fence in the middle of nowhere. Gabriel explains to us that there are human footprints there.

But not just any footprints. Archaeologists date these prints to be around 100,000 years old!

We drive along Lake Natron on its western shore until we reach the border with Kenya. There we turn west and then south again to enter the Serengeti National Park via the northern entrance.

This whole trip is like a dream. It’s an adventure and offers all the things I expect from Africa in my imagination. But more than that, every day brings new surprises!