Kenya Safari

(Please scroll down for the blog photos, thanks)

We left Kimilili on 19^th November with some mixed emotions. It’s never easy to say goodbye. But we were really looking forward to having a hot shower! We had a longish wait at Kitale airfield, but one thing we’ve become really good at is waiting! The airport building, the size of a small bungalow, contained toilets, office, check-in, security and control tower, together with a first-class lounge (a three piece suite) and economy (ordinary chairs). The baggage reclaim was the grass outside. Back in Nairobi we stayed at the Wildebeest Camp, run by an Aussie couple with two very young children. Our (posh, with ensuite!) tent was very comfortable and the food delicious, definitely recommended. It was good to chat with other ‘muzungas’ (white people) too!

On the Sunday we visited the David Sheldrick elephant orphanage – sooo cute! And the giraffe centre at Langata, very touristy but giraffes are my (Jane’s) favourite animal so I had to see them.

On Monday we were collected at 7:30 by Kamel, our very knowledgeable guide and driver for the next week. We had an 8-seater Toyota Land Cruiser all to ourselves. We left Nairobi in drizzling rain for the long drive to Samburu National Park. Sadly we did not get a good view of Mount Kenya, due to the low cloud, but the road was surprisingly good and we arrived in time for lunch. We almost had the place to ourselves, there were only two other parties there when we arrived. Such a contrast to the previous five weeks, the lodge was very comfortable, the food good, and there was even a swimming pool. It occurred to us that visitors who spent their whole time in Kenya at such safari lodges would gain a very different experience of Kenya from the one we’d had. At Samburu, in complete contrast to Nairobi it was hot, though not uncomfortably so, but the landscape was surprisingly green due to the exceptionally high rainfall in the last month. At 3:30 we set off for our first game drive, which got us off to a very lucky start, within 15 minutes we had seen 3 cheetahs and a group of 6 ‘reticulated’ giraffes. The next morning, waking at 6am, I looked out of the window and saw a very large elephant just a few metres away. At Samburu we saw many elephants, all reddish brown from the colour of the soil, which they cover themselves with. We also saw ostriches, oryx, Grevey’s zebra (thinner stripes), gerenuk, impala, gazelles and dikdiks. We saw many beautiful birds, including the superb starling, which Kamel considered too common to stop for but was a striking deep blue. The night was quite noisy with a frog chorus and the trumpeting of at least one elephant nearby.

Our next stop was The Ol Pejeta Conservancy, (via a ‘tourist stop’ at the Equator line) where we stayed in another posh tent, overlooking a water hole where a group of giraffes and zebras were waiting for us. We could also see a family of warthogs with 4 babies, impala, and in the distance, a rhino and 2 silver-backed jackals. That afternoon our game drive took in more gazelles, water bucks, a small pride of very sleepy lions, eagles, buffalo, white and black rhino, then, on the way back, a group of elephants with a baby only a couple of days old. The weather there turned cooler again and we were very appreciative of the hot water bottles that the housekeeper had provided us with.

The next day we moved on to Lake Nakuru where the highlight of our small bungalow was that it had a bath! A luxurious soak before dinner was a real treat. Again we saw many beautiful birds, and more rhino. Down at the lake there were flocks of pelicans and flamingos, as well as storks. The late afternoon light and a rainbow allowed Robin to take some really atmospheric pictures of the waterside birds and a group of buffalo. An early start the next morning and we set off in the rain for the Maasai Mara. By the time we arrived the rain was heavy, and we had to drive through a couple of streams much above their usual level. Not how I had imagined the Mara at all. However Kamel was dedicated to his job and we set off for an afternoon game drive despite the weather. We saw a pair of female lions, one had three cubs and the other was heavily pregnant. They had caught a wildebeest and were having a feast (the cubs were just having a lick; they were young and still nursing). The following morning we set off early for a fairly long drive to the Mara River, which is famous for the annual wildebeest migration. We soon came across two huge crocodiles, sleeping head to toe in the mud of the riverbank, and a group of hippos. We also learned a new euphemism for having a pee, ‘checking the tyre pressure’! On the game drives we had to do that in open country, if you went behind a tree you might be gobbled up very quickly! So I won’t forget the ‘comfort stop’ I had to take on top of a hill where I could see across the Tanzanian border to the Serengeti in one direction and most of the Maasai Mara in the other!

Sunday 27^th November, the long-awaited date (by me anyway!) of our return to England. It started early with 1 ½ hours on a very bumpy road from the game park back to the main road. We arrived back in Nairobi in time for a visit to the Karen Blixen Museum (remember Meryl Streep in ‘Out of Africa’?) and lunch in the garden of the nearby restaurant. Very colonial. Then another drive through Nairobi’s totally crazy traffic to the airport. Our flight to Heathrow left at 11:30pm, so we had another long wait, but we are good at those, thanks to Prof. Layton on the Nintendo DS and a book of Daily Telegraph general knowledge crosswords.

Now we are back in England and suddenly it’s Christmas everywhere – we hadn’t given it a thought in Africa. (Actually there was one motorcycle taxi driver in Kimilili who always wore a Santa hat). Apologies if this sounds trite, but my time in Africa has reduced my enthusiasm for all the things I apparently ‘must have’ and ‘must do’. The thing we are both most looking forward to is seeing our families again.

Lake Nakuru

Kamel our excellent driver and guide

A sausage tree