Our African Safari - Day Three (Lion cubs, Zebras, Elephants and more inside the Ngorongoro Crater)

Our third day on safari was an amazing one, experiencing some really great photo opportunities. It was our second and final day in the Ngorongoro crater, so we got up nice and early to catch the good morning light. This meant that we got our wake up call (one of the Maasai tribes members quietly saying hello from outside our luxury tents). We also got to experience our second chance at talking showers (the Maasai putting a ladder behind our tent and pouring perfectly hot water into a bladder to fill our shower water, and then telling us that we were ready for our shower).  I love this!!!

Once we were up and had a nice omelet breakfast, we headed down into the crater.

As we were driving down into the crater, I saw this lone gazelle up on the crest of the hillside, with nice morning light shining on him. I asked Sam, our driver, to stop at this vantage point so that we could get a shot of this animal with the distant mountains far in the background. I took this photo with the Canon 1DX Mark II and Canon 200-400mm lens at 560mm (using the built in teleconverter). I used the best aperture I could (f/5.6) to create separation between the gazelle and the background.

Not long after the gazelle photo, we spotted a pack of lions with cubs. We were all VERY excited to see these youngsters!!

Aren't they just the cutest things ever?

This is one of my favorite photos of the mothers and cubs, mostly because the cub is in the same stance as the lioness.

Once I got the shots of the adult lions and cubs, I then zoomed in tighter to get these isolated shots of the little guys.

They walked right behind our vehicle as we all snapped away.

They walked from our right to our left, which meant that they went from the good front lighting, to being back lit. But that was not going to stop us from shooting. The rim light really worked well on the cubs.

As they walked away from us, we watched as the mother lioness kept a watchful eye on each of the cubs.

We continued our drive around the crater and saw this mother and baby zebra loving each other.

Ahhhhhhhhhhhh. Another "too cute" moment. I guess this loving photo is appropriate for today (Valentines Day).

We saw a small herd of elephants off in the distance and decided to stop our vehicle and wait to see if they would walk towards us. I fired off this photo to show you the size of the elephant as compared to the zebra. It is amazing how the elephant dwarfs the zebras even though the elephant is farther in the background.

Our waiting paid off, as the elephants made their way closer to us. Seeing these massive beasts up close is indescribable.

At one point, the four elephants all came together and I was telling everyone "shoot this grouping!" as they lined up so perfectly.

We drove forward another 100 feet to try and get directly in front of the elephant. It was awesome!!!!

They came right for us.

Click the image above to watch the video

Here is a quick video clip to show you just how close you get to the animals in Africa.

Later we stopped at a bathroom spot and saw this elephant hanging out in the mud. Gregg, one of our workshop attendees, had fun photographing from outside the vehicle (as we all did).

I love the look of the Grey-crowned Crane, but especially liked getting this photo of the two birds criss crossing each other in nearly perfect symmetry.

This one crane looked up at me as I was shooting tight photos. I love the look!

This is a tighter crop of the same photo, giving you a better view of the crane's face.

The day ended with us showing up to our next tent lodge just in time for a short hike up a hillside to watch the sunset. The sunset was not very interesting, but I liked this view back towards our lodge. Then we were off for a lovely 4 course dinner and some time to relax and recharge for the next day.

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If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.

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Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world.
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Our African Safari - Day Two (Zebras, Lions, and more)

The second day of our safari was the first full day out looking at the wildlife. We got up early in the morning and drove down into the Ngorongoro crater. This is a great place to see lots of animals in a vast flat crater.

I should mention that I am posting all the images mostly in chronological order, so that you can get a sense of what we saw at each moment.

As we drove down into the crater, we came across these two zebras, a mother and a youngster.

Everyone in our group fell in love with the baby zebras. They are just too darned cute. I used the Canon 1DX Mark II with Canon 200-400mm lens at 260mm to isolate this little guy. You will notice the brown fur on the young zebra. All of them are born with brown stripes and then, as they age, they quickly turn to black.

I then flipped the switch on the Canon 200-400mm lens (which activates the built-in tele converter) and shot this photo at 560mm.

Oh, and for all those people who asked me why I was using the 200-400mm lens, when I did not list it in my pre-trip gear list, I can tell you the story. I was planning on using the Canon 100-400mm lens (which is much lighter and easier to handhold), but one of our tour attendees was having technical issues with her camera setup, so I let her use my 100-400mm lens for the whole trip. Luckily we had Canon Professional Services loan us some additional gear, including the 200-400mm lens.

It was early on our second day when we came across our first lioness. I loved how she stood so perfectly in the backlight!

We all enjoyed photographing the wart hogs as they knelt down to graze. They sure are funny looking animals. :)

As drove along the roads of the crater, we came upon this awesome group of lions. I was excited to get really close to a large male. We didn't have this opportunity all that often on our last trip to Tanzania.

Here is a shot of the female looking up at the male.

Here is another photo taken at the full 560mm of that long lens. What an awesome creature!

The most common question I get from people is "How close do you get to the animals?" Well...this photo should give you a good idea of how close we are. It is not uncommon for the lions to come and rest in the shade of the vehicles.

This bird is called a Kori Bustard.

I saw these two Grey-crowned cranes hanging out by a Wildebeest corpse and thought it was an interesting mix of beautiful birds and death.

Don't worry, I made sure to isolate one photo just showing the beauty of this crane.

Every time I travel into the Ngorongoro crater I can't help but be awed by the vastness of the land. This is an environmental shot (taken wide) to show all the wildlife that inhabits the area. I focused on the zebras, since they are my main subjects, but made sure to include the other animals and safari vehicles in the background.

More baby zebra photos, since we could not get enough of their cuteness.

This heron cracked me up. I took numerous photos of this bird, but when looking through the images that evening, I laughed at the "attitude" that this bird is showing. This photo really needs a quote underneath it. Got any suggestions?

We were photographing more wildlife when my wife spotted this large flock of birds coming our direction. I quickly reframed my shot, focused on the zebra and fired off this image.

I have always loved the look of the Helmeted Guineafowl and was taking photos os this one, when he hopped onto this rock and shared the spotlight with a smaller bird. I like having both birds in this shot, since it adds more interest than a solo shot of the fowl.

It is funny, I have never really thought that birding (doing bird photography) is something that would ever interest me, but after seeing all these awesome birds in Tanzania, I get the allure for sure. Here is a photo of the awesome Tawny Eagle. (Photographer's note: You will notice that I try to get my bird shots with nothing distracting in the foreground or background. This separation helps get a clean image and keep your focus on the bird and not the other areas.)

Here is a photo of myself and our three awesome guides, Godwin, Sam, and Godfrey. We always use these three guys since they are the best in the business. I really like this photo of the four of us (and I usually don't like photos of me, which is why I am BEHIND the camera and not in front of it).

Stay tuned for Day 3 and more!

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And also, remember that you and your friends can enter your email address at the top right of this blog to get an email any time I write a new blog post.

__________________________________________________________________________

If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.

__________________________________________________________________________
Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world.
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Our African Safari - Day One (We kick off the trip, leaving town and heading for the plains)

If you follow Jeff Cable Photography on Facebook or Instagram, you probably know that I just completed another photo tour with M&M Photo Tours. And just like last year, we made the long trip to Tanzania to go on another safari adventure.

And, like last year, I am going to blog the photos and stories from each day so that you can virtually come along with us on this epic trip.

This is a photo of our group. We all met for the first time in the Amsterdam airport, where we got to know each other. We then flew from Amsterdam to Kilimanjaro airport and landed in Tanzania around 10pm. We went straight to a lodge and got a good night's sleep. This photo was taken first thing in the morning as we prepared to take off on our first day of safari.

The first day is a lot of driving, as we make our way through Arusha and head out towards the open land. As we were driving away from the "city", I saw a large group of Maasai out in the distance. I asked Sam, our guide, what was happening. He said that it was a market where the Maasai were selling their goats. My next question was..."Can we go there and take some photos?" After a slight pause, he said "Sure, let's give it a try."

They checked with the Maasai who were OK with us shooting photos, and so that is what we did. At first, we did so from the vehicles, but since they were not objecting to us shooting, we all got out and took photos of these tribes members.

I really like photographing things like this since they are not staged for tourists, but real happenings in a foreign land.

The Maasai dress in the most amazing colors.

As we were entering the Tarangire National Park, I spotted this one Maasai youngster with his face painted. I knew, from my last trip to Tanzania, that this meant that this young man had recently been circumcised and sent away from his tribe to become a man.

The first animal that we spotted in Tarangire National Park was this Gazelle. I liked the way that he was peaking out from behind this tree.

Tarangire National Park is known for their elephants, and we were very excited to see dozens of them there.

Last year we only saw 5 elephants on our trip, whereas this year this was only the beginning. Throughout the two weeks in Tanzania, I think we saw more than 250 this year!

The baboons are always fun to photograph, since you can get really close to them and they have great expressions.

I caught these two baboon cleaning each other. How cute.

These were my favorite photos from the first day of the safari, but trust me, it only got better from there. So stay tuned as I continue to post images on the blog.

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And also, remember that you and your friends can enter your email address at the top right of this blog to get an email any time I write a new blog post.

__________________________________________________________________________

If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.

__________________________________________________________________________
Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world.
__________________________________________________________________________