Nikao

thx TC.. i will check it out!

sdb2

Nikao, I recently communicated with someone at Adventure Camps who passed this info to me. I thought you might be interested.

"We learned some incredible things with him [the guide], seing owls on three different occasions in the two days we had [in Ruaha], and we even saw a Pangolin! amazing. Cheetah too, lots of lion - no wild dogs any more in Ruaha. They are around, but not frequently in the national park, they are more often in the surrounding ecosystems of Rungwe etc. Some clients that left the day we arrived had seen leopard and cheetah on the same day..."

Nikao

thx sdb2! .. i've heard about Pangolin sightings more than once from them... impressive! ..
really sorry to hear about the dogs in Ruaha though, as they are my favorite... Let's hope i'll catch them in Selous then

but im also very much looking forward to the surroundings/landscape and the birds.. (unlike previous 2 times where I was much more focussed on the mammals)

Nikao

my travel agency contacted both camps and unfortunately they came back with the message that private vehicles are (still) not possible....
ah well.. we'll see how it goes... hoping on 2 or 3 groups of 4 people in the camp who will share their vehicle as a group hehe...

sdb2

Sorry to hear that. As you say, maybe some people will group together and a car will be free. You can always ask when you're there. Your trip is soon, yes?

TC

Nikao, We found that often a group would request to be together, leaving us in a vehicle alone. In Ruaha, the one gentleman assigned to our car was rather unsociable. The following day HE requested (and paid for) a vehicle alone. By default we got our own guide, driver, and car at NO EXTRA charge. Yahoo. We did find that the camp managers are quite good at matchmaking. We enjoyed are time spent with new friends. Be quite open about your needs and desires for the drives. We made it very clear that we are photographers, but that we also wanted to sit for long periods and watch animal interaction -- not just rush from one sighting to the next.

Nikao

@TC "We made it very clear that we are photographers, but that we also wanted to sit for long periods and watch animal interaction -- not just rush from one sighting to the next."

that's exactly what I'm looking for. That's why I was interested in 1 (or 2) days having the car to myself.
Besides that I would love to meet the other people
I'll have faith in the matchmaking skills of the camps

@sdb2 i'll see how it is when I arrive indeed ..i'll be there on september 11, so less than 3 weeks!