It was our next to last day at the wonderful Seronera Serengeti Lodge where we had been consistently killing the Leopards (at least in a figurative photographic sense). I walked into my room, put some of my gear down here and there, and was puzzled when I noted that the bedspread on my bed was missing…. And then I noticed some black marks on the exposed top sheet. We had driven through some burned areas but I had no idea how any of the ash had gotten on my gear, nor did I remember putting anything down on the end of the bed. So I became even more puzzled. <\/p>\n
Next I went to the open suitcase on the other bed to grab a handful of cashews from my stash. One intact bag remained but the open bag of nuts that had been in the plastic supermarket bag was gone. Then I looked down and saw that the opened, yellow, 500 gram bag that the cashew nuts had come in was on the floor. Torn and empty. With a few cashew crumbs scattered about. “Man, I thought, that is not like the wonderful room attendants at any of the places we have visited. Who would think that one of them would stoop to stealing a guest’s cashew nuts?” <\/p>\n
I walked back to my bed and took a closer look at the black discolorations on the sheet. Could they be small footprints? Just then a breeze ruffled the curtains. I glanced to my left and remembered that I had hung some laundry on the balcony railing but had forgotten to close and lock the door. Mystery solved. The Olive Baboons had raided my room. (It is doubtful that the much smaller Vervet Monkeys could have carried off the bedspread.)<\/p>\n
When we check out the next day, I confessed to the desk clerk. Her smile indicated that I was not the first to be victimized. When we returned to Seronera a week later for a single night on our way to Ngorongoro Crater I was delighted to learn that a search of the area behind my room had turned up the missing bedspread none-the-worse-for-wear. <\/p>\n