Saturday, May 28, 2011

May Final Friday Winner!

Hi all!  Hope you guys had a good week!  Sorry for being a day late to post this, but I had the lovely surprise of getting a virus on my computer yesterday....so not fun!  After spending all morning researching and working to get it off of our computer, I think I was able to quarantine and take care of it {fingers crossed}.  So, without further adieu, one day later....let's find out who the winner is, shall we?  So the lucky winner is....
Lucky #7, who happens to be Brenda H!  Congrats, Brenda!

Thanks all for playing in May's abbreviated Final Friday Giveaway!  I will let you all enjoy the rest of your Memorial Day weekend.  I'll try and post more crafty things soon...I promise!

Toodles, for now :)


Wednesday, May 25, 2011

Last and final Safari destination - Serengeti

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Serengeti, a set on Flickr.
Hello there! Today I'm sharing the last segment of our safari trip to Tanzania, Africa. We went to the Serengeti and stayed at the beautiful Serengeti Migration Camp. The area is sooo vast with the terrain varying from a wooded region to an expanse of grassy plains as far as the eye can see. In addition to all the animals we had seen in the previous 3 locations, we were still introduced to a bunch more! And, we even got to witness the incredible wildabeest migration! It's nothing I've ever seen before....a sea of animals all heading North as part of their annual migration. You'll see these pics in the series. There's a picture that shows they fill the plains and extend to the horizon. It was incredible.

At the camp, we encountered an adorable animal called the Hyrax and I totally wanted to take one home with me. See if you can spot them in the series - it looks like a cross of a cat and squirrel with no tail and just the cutest round body.

Well, I hope you enjoy this last set! I can't say enough how much we enjoyed this trip and would highly recommend going on safari at some point in your life - truly amazing and inspiring to get a glimpse of nature's playground. I would also highly recommend our tour operator - Elewana Skysafari. Everyone and everything we encountered, from the staff and activities to all the properties we stayed at were amazing and absolutely fabulous! I really can't say enough.

Hope you all have a wonderful day!

Oh - one last thing on a completely different note - today is the last day to play in my May giveaway, so if you'd like to take a stab at winning the free stamp set, please go and leave a comment on the May Final Friday Giveaway post!


Monday, May 23, 2011

3rd Safari Stop - Ngorongoro Crater

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Ngorongoro Crater, a set on Flickr.

Hi bloggie friends! How are you guys? Hope you're enjoying the pictures so far. This set is from our third destination at the Ngorongoro Crater. We stayed at the lovely Manor at Ngorongoro which was just so beautiful and unexpectedly decadent while on safari. We even had a little downtime to get massages in between our game drives. The Ngorongoro crater is actually a caldera, which is roughly 18 km in diameter. It's amazing that such a broad spectrum of animals found a way of life there in the bottom of the crater. We saw lions, buffalo, and rhinos here to round out our Big 5 sightings! I will have to caution you that viewer discretion is advised when viewing this set - there's a series of pictures of lions mating, and a few snaps of lionnesses guarding their kill. But, this is nature, so it was awesome to see live! The weather here was actually a little like home - overcast and misty in the morning and then it cleared up and warmed to mid to upper 70s. It even rained here during both nights we were there. The terrain actually reminded me a lot of Hawaii {probably because of its volcanic influences!}. Anyway, enjoy this set! Oh, and feel free to leave me a comment if you have any questions about any pictures, places or animals!! I'll be happy to comment in the string for everyone's benefit :)

One last thing - the first few photos of the pink dots and pink masses...can you guess what those are? I know it kinda looks like a petri dish of growth {at least, to me!} but they are actually masses of flamingos in Lake Manyara!! It was an incredible view from the plane.

I'll be posting our last and final stop tomorrow...the grand finale of our trip, the Serengeti.