Hiking and Waterfalls



The waterfall on the first day's hike



Our second national park experience was at Udzungwa National Park. We arrived on Wednesday after finishing our last game drive at Mikumi. The accommodations here are fantastic! We are being so spoiled that it will be hard to leave. Not only are the rooms and service great, but we also have some amazing views from our balconies. The resort is situated on a mountain and is surrounded by rain forest, so everywhere you look is green scenery. Wednesday afternoon most of the group went on a hike through the forest near the resort. We were led by Babu, a 74-year old man who could beat any of us college students at a hike. He led us through some thick patches of forest and on narrow, muddy paths that would at times take on a pretty significant incline. We were grabbing at trees along the path to pull ourselves up. The first place he took us was a beautiful waterfall. It wasn’t huge but still so cool to be able to stand near. The hike continued through some intense terrain before we were led to a “swimming pool”. A small area just beyond some rapids served to cool us down and was so much fun! The current wasn’t strong enough to cause problems for anything but a few clothing articles that were being pulled in unwanted directions. We were still soaking by the time we made it back to the resort and got to take full advantage the awesome showers in our rooms.

Meghan, Amy, Anastasia,  Natalie and Michael
swimming after the first hike

The following day, Thursday, we went on a hike to Sanje Falls in Udzungwa National Park. The hike started out slow as we were stopping and going to see the different trees and plants growing in the forest. We did see mango, guava and banana trees as well as lemon grass. The hike was a really good workout with all the stairs we climbed along the trail. It was so worth it once we got to the top. We were standing atop a 660-foot waterfall looking out across the sugarcane fields. It was such an amazing sight and almost unreal. We proceeded to eat our lunch out on the rocks just before the big drop-- it was so awesome! There were two more waterfalls we went to, both smaller than the first but still neat to see, before we hiked back down to the bottom of the first waterfall for another swimming adventure, this time in which Bwana Shawn joined us. The water was so cold today and the current was stronger but it was very cool to look up to the top of the waterfall and know that we had hiked the entire way up.