Wow! Wow! Wow! That’s what our safari guide Malaki Samuel kept saying as we encountered a huge migration of wildebeests and zebras.
This is considered early in the year for the annual migration which begins in the southern Serengeti as the animals set off looking for greener grass to feed on.
We must have seen over a million zebra and wildebeests migrating together. It was just unbelievable.
Malaki estimated we drove some 8 kilometres with wildebeests and zebras in masses all around us for the entire distance.

Malaki our guide who has worked in the Serengeti for 15 years said he had never witnessed wildebeests and zebras migrating together and as we kept seeing more and more he repeated over and over again Wow! Wow! Wow!
This is also the time of year the wildebeests give birth to babies and we were fortunate enough to witness that happening as well.
Malaki spotted a mother wildebeest giving birth near a whole bunch of other mothers who’d just had babies and seemed to be grouping together to protect their newborns on the migration.
We watched for about 30 minutes as the wildebeest in labour walked around- the baby emerging from her rear end, first the legs and then the rest of the body.
The little thing had just plopped to the ground when we noticed a hyena nearby eyeing the newborn. Malaki told us he had seen a baby wildebeest harvested by a hyena before.
We waited with bated breath hoping that wouldn’t happen this time. And it didn’t! The hyena ran right by the newborn and its mother.
Did you know wildebeests are pregnant for eight and a half months almost the same length of time as humans?
Malaki our guide taught us lots about both zebras and wildebeests.
Something I thought was amazing about zebras was that the stripes on each one are absolutely unique.
A zebra’s stripe pattern is really like a fingerprint!
Something I didn’t know about wildebeests is that they are also called gnus. I thought those were two different animals.
Perhaps the zebra-patterned china at our safari lodge should have been a sign that we were going to see something phenomenal in the zebra world. The joint migration of zebras and wildebeests was certainly a spectacle we won’t ever forget!
Every day on our safari we keep having these amazing once-in-a-lifetime experiences that make us so glad we decided to embark on our African adventure.
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