On top of the crater rim

For a perfect end of the day, at dusk we get stuck in a traffic jam right on top of the crater road. Safari car after safari car with us in the middle. A broken-down bus blocks the road in front of us and a truck got stuck in the mud next to it at the attempt of passing it. While we walk around and talk to the other tourists and their drivers, a huge and heavy yellow road grader is called to rescue but finds himself sliding down the crater slopes on the attempt of driving around both stuck vehicles. No chance for him to get back up on the road on this very evening, haha!

By 9 p. m. all tourists from the stuck safari cars get evacuated to their camps. Just their drivers are left with us. After cooking on-road pasta we decide to simply sleep in the car between all the other cars and trucks. At 10 p. m. somebody knocks on our window to tell us that we got permission to bypass the traffic jam through the Ngorongoro crater for free! (This alone costs 295 USD and is not allowed in the dark.) But most of the drivers with their safari cars have already left an we would be the only ones driving alone at night through the crater. Uff. We are totally wasted after this full day and fall back into our deep slumber 😴. Better to drive down into the crater in the morning ...

But what happens at night is truly a wonder. Before the first light dawns, we are woken up by sporadically passing safari cars, coming from the direction of the road block. Some alien force must have pulled away the broken bus in the middle of the night as the stuck truck is gone in the morning! We did not hear nor see anything while we were sleeping. We are surprised to find ourselves in thick morning fog being the last and only remaining car in the middle of the road. And an unblocked road implies that there is no more reason to claim a gratis detour through the crater. Damn! At least the misty clouds dissolve when we arrive at the viewpoint for an extensive breakfast with gorgeous views down into the crater for sunrise. Yeehaaw!Read more