16th February 2013
No nasty noises in the night but we were up at 5am in order to get the tent down and be at the Rangers HQ for our 6am game walk. They provide a ranger (with a very old, quite small calibre gun) and a guide neither of whom speak good English and the spent most of the walk chatting between themselves which spoilt things a little. Still we saw plenty of antelope and deer, a few giraffe and baboons. It was quite exciting as you are always concerned that round the next bush you will run into a lion.
Earlier of course we took the tent down without the armed guard, very brave.
We were both tired by the time we got back to the car at 9.30 so we drove round to the Saadani Lodge for breakfast.
We were met by the manager (who is a Brit) and had a simple but good breakfast (although like everywhere else we have been their bacon is awful). As the hotel is only 1km along the beach from our camp site we also booked in for dinner. The lodge seems empty but a really nice place, if they reduced their prices they may get more people.
It only took 20 minutes to walk along the beach to the restaurant in the evening, we had a very good dinner, orange salad followed by fish kebabs and mousse, at a set price of $30 so why is the hotel so expensive ($250 pp per night)? Whilst eating we had a visit from a civet who was presumably after scraps. The walk back to the camp site was great, chasing crabs in the dark and not being eaten by lions followed by a good nights sleep.
Next morning we walked back for breakfast ($10), used their WiFi and pretended we were living the high life in the swanky hotel but actually camping on the beach.