The Ngorongoro Crater is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and a fabulous place to visit.

It is also the world’s largest Caldera, formed by the explosion of a volcano thought to be around 5,000 metres high 2-3 million years ago.

The base of the crater contains lakes, swamps and grasslands and is around 260 sq km in size.

Now it’s a nature reserve with an extraordinary amount of wildlife, with so many resources available all year round, most do not need to migrate.

There are no Giraffes here given the steep 600 metre high slopes that surround the crater.

Our first encounter as we dropped down into the crater was this old elephant, likely 40-50 years old.

The plains in the crater teem with wildlife

Within the crater sits lake Magadi which is home to many different species of birds, including pelicans and flamingos.

Stood tall with their reflections glistening in the lake, it is a beautiful site to see.

There are two main swamps here where many older elephants graze as the wet grass is easier to eat as their teeth decay with age. Many spend their last days here.

The lions in the crater are know for being very lazy! That’s likely because there is so much prey easily spotted across the vast expanse of grasslands of the crater.

The crater is also the best place to spot black rhinos. They keep their distance, but we saw 5 of them the afternoon we visited.

These shots were all taken from quite a distance as I enviously watched others with their big long lenses and I struggled with my Iphone!

Rhinos are very territorial and we saw a few chasing away other grazers straying too close to them.

There are ostriches here too, the black coloured one is the male, the greyish brown ones are female.

Before we left the crater we stopped for lunch by a lake. The birds crowd the picnic eaters for scraps and we saw a hawk swoop down to grab a chicken leg off of one person’s plate while he held it. The look in his face was a picture I didn’t get!

There are some hippo’s in the lake but having been spoilt by our encounter in the Serengeti I focused on my lunch, you get food and wildlife spoilt on this trip!

That’s likely the last safari on this trip across Africa, well I say that now anyway, let’s see what happens.

After two months in East Africa, tomorrow we fly out of Tanzania and head to South Africa to continue our trip.

I can’t wait to see more of this wonderful continent.