A week off - the Ferry across Lake Victoria, Speke Bay Lodge and Mwanza

Usambiro Barbet

Last week was Standard Seven exams where all the primary school leavers sit a series of exams to see if they can progress to secondary school.  Jenny has explained this in her blog (http://wantingafrica.blogspot.com/).  In practical terms it meant that Jenny could have the week off because the exam period coincided with the end of Ramadan and Friday was a public holiday.  On the advice of the Tanzanian Bird Atlas chap - Neil Baker - we booked into Speke Bay Lodge for four nights. 

Black-chested Snake-Eagle

First we had to cross mighty Lake Victoria.  The MV Victoria leaves Bukoba three nights a week (Mon, Wed and Fri) and takes all night to get to Mwanza.  We had first class cabins and were quite comfortable but the toilets were dire!  The term "banana boat" could have been invented for this ferry (see pics on Jenny's blog). 

Verreaux's Eagle-Owl

Once in Mwanza ( the second largest city in Tanzania but still with a frontier town feel), we took a taxi to the bus terminal north of the city and quickly found ourselves on a coach to Kenya.  Two hours later we disembarked at the small town of Lamadi and taxied back to Speke Bay Lodge. 

Hamerkop

Speke was one of the early European explorers of darkest Africa and Speke Bay is the south-eastern point of Lake Victoria.  It is also one of the closest points to Serengeti National Park.  Lots of safari companies run tours from here but the ones we looked at wanted far too much money for just the two of us so we opted out this time.

Little Egret

The four days at the lodge were very pleasant with great food, excellent staff and lots of interesting bush to explore.  Most people we met were passing through with one of the many safari company tours and I don't think anyone else stayed more than one night.

Pied Kingfisher

The birds were the highlight for me (Jenny seemed to enjoy them as well).  I ended up with 112 species.  Most of the european migrants species had yet to arrive so I thought this was quite a good effort.  No doubt I missed a few species because there were new ones every time I ventured out.

Silverbird

The highlights included:  Yellow-billed Stork, Black-chested Snake-Eagle, Grey-breasted Spurfowl, Spotted Redshank, Wood Sandpiper, Ruff, Two-banded Courser, White-winged Tern, Didric Cuckoo, Verreaux's Eagle-Owl, Blue-naped Mousebird, African Pygmy Kingfisher, Madagascar Bee-eater, Usambiro Barbet, Fischer's Sparrow-Lark, Rufous Chatterer, Grey-capped Warbler, Buff-bellied Warbler, Silverbird, Paradise Flycatcher, Black-headed Gonolek, Slate-coloured Boubou, Slender-billed Weaver, Black-necked Weaver, Blue-capped Cordon-bleu, Red-faced Crombec and Grey-capped Social Weaver.

Superb Starling

The sheer spectacle of the various herons, ibis, openbills, egrets, cormorants, fish-eagles etc settling down each evening was probably the thing we will remember most.

Swamp Flycatcher

Reluctantly we left Speke Bay and took taxis back to Mwanza and the Tilapia Hotel which was also very good with free wireless internet and a nice garden setting on a quiet bay in the lake.  Home on the ferry again Friday night.










Bye for now…

Monday 13th September 2010, Bukoba