SAFARI!

Day 3 – 25 September

NB: Almost all the photos in this post are taken by Janine or Thom.

The next morning we awake at 5:30 for 6:00 breakfast and head out on safari by 7:00. We see reebok, wildebeest, Thompson’s Gazelle, impala, water buffalo,

Water buffalo with oxpecker hitchhikers. These are massive animals.

topi,

This is a Topi (antelope) and her baby.

Then the baby decided it was time to nurse. Our guide said the baby was probably only a couple days old.

cassowary, ostrich,

Ostrich

lions,

young male lion

cheetah,

Cheetah

leopard,

This is what we saw with our naked eye of the leopard.

leopard sleeping

leopard napping in a tree

giraffes,

Giraffe family having lunch.

zebras,

Zebras became so common place that we stopped taking pictures of them.

elephants, hippos,

hippos in the Mara river

We didn’t see many hippo faces. These were mostly submerged like this.

crocodiles,

Crocodile on the Mara river bank

Crocodile lounging in the mud along the river bank.

Saddlebill Stork,

A little closer view of the saddlebill stork

Superb Starlings, Martial Eagle, a Lilac Breasted Roller (bird), vultures,

vulture venturing toward breakfast

and hyena.

Hyena under a tree

I was struck by how powerful and large this hyena is.

Lunch is packed for us and we have a picnic on the savanna.

safari me in the Masai Mara

I have never seen this before. It was a rainbow ring around the sun at about midday.

It’s a very long day in the van when we return to camp at 4:30.

Nora, Janine, Chantelle and me holding the only rhinos we were able to spot.

At 5:00 we head for the Maasai village. The men sing and dance a welcome again.

the village men sing us a welcome

There are many children and dogs,

The children of the village just outside the village fence.

then the women do a welcome dance

Women of the village singing a welcome to us.

and we tour the village.

Janine, Thom, me, Chantelle with members of Jonathan’s family

I tried for too long to make a fire. They finally took the stick from me to do it.

Cattle are kept in the center of the village,

Cattle being brought into the center of the village where they are kept during the night.

houses are near the encircling fence and each family has their own gate. There are separate pens for sheep and goats.

Standing in the sheep (or goat) pen.

Then we tour inside Jonathan’s house, which is so VERY small, dark and claustrophobic.

stick and dung house belonging to Jonathan

Not sure what this room was used for, but it was the entrance to Jonathan’s house. That’s a chicken walking around inside.

The only small window in the whole house, so it was incredibly dark and stuffy inside.

me, Thom, Janine, and Chantelle inside Jonathan’s house (he took the photo)

He sells us necklaces and bracelets.

Bargaining with Jonathan as others look on.

We walk to the school

As evening rolls in we walk to school.

and see the things painted on the walls (few to no posters, so paint the anchor charts on the wall). The small classrooms

Kandra (in scarf), me and Nora sitting at the desks in a school room.

cram 75 students in each and many of the students are boarding at the school. We walk back to the camp from the school. My foot is quite sore again. Dinner,

Nora and me with a local beer at dinner.

campfire, shower, and bed once again.

It’s my birthday…

Day 2, September 24 – Happy Birthday to me

Breakfast is at 6:00 the next morning and we pile into our vans (same people for the duration of the trip now) to leave by 7:00 am. A six-hour journey begins. The roads are not spectacular anyway, but as we get more remote they worsen. Then after four hours, we emerge onto a gravel roadway that is washboard and pot holed. It is extremely bumpy and loud.  We stop at a viewpoint above the Rift Valley

Me with the Rift Valley in the background

and do a little more shopping (2 more masks) and use the bathroom.

Rock hyrax or “dassie” on the other side of the wall at our roadside stop.

We arrive at the camp in the Maasai Mara and are greeted by Masai warriors who do a welcome dance. They also intone a “song” as they dance. After they sing, they begin competing with each other for who can jump the highest.

They’re still intoning, but the jumping contest begins.

The man in jeans to the right is Moe, who was the organizer for this trip. They’re getting him to jump with them.

One of the warriors then carries our bags and shows us to our tent. Our warrior’s western name was Malachi.

Malachi and me

We are in large canvas tents, 3 beds to a tent (two with mosquito netting), flushing toilet, sink, and shower. The shower and the toilet have shower curtain “doors” that don’t quite cover the doorway completely. The tent is on a concrete platform and there is a thatched roof above, however when it rained it came through the thatch and the canvas to puddle on our floor.

At 4:45 pm we leave for our first safari.

These are our vans. We had seven for our group.

We see many gazelle, impala, zebra, and wildebeest. Then we see a pregnant lioness and head back to camp.

Impala
Thom’s photo

Wildebeests and a Thompson’s Gazelle

This small river, or possibly just a watering hole.

Zebras and wildebeests

Lioness, possibly pregnant or recently gave birth

As the sun was going down after rain.

Arriving back at 6:30 we go directly to dinner and then after dinner there is a campfire. Several Masai warriors join us. Jonathan and Moses tell stories of their coming of age and hunting lions.

Stories around the campfire

I head back to the tent and shower in time enough to be in bed by 10:30.

Karibu Kenya!

Day One, 22 September – 23 September

Welcome billboard

Abdul arrives to take me to the airport at 7:30 pm. Traffic is very bad getting out of Mahboula and again arriving at the airport. I go first to the money exchange and turn 90KD into about $295 USD. Then on to check-in. The line is snaking back and forth and people keep cutting in. Thom arrives and joins me in line. We wait for at least an hour and then at the Emirates counter we are told that they “have a booking for us, but no ticket.” After being shuffled to another person, we are forced (as we don’t want to miss our connection or the trip is lost) to buy new tickets. They don’t take credit cards. I went to ATM. It was broken. I would miss my flight if I went looking for another, so the guy takes my $295 cash and says he will exchange it later (I did get a receipt, but I’m still trying to get a refund for the second ticket purchase.) This was very stressful and put a very bad taste in my mouth for Emirates Airways (This has yet to be resolved.). Our flight was due to leave as we were going through immigration, but it was delayed so were able to board. We finally arrive in Dubai and parade all over the airport before finding our gate. I meet Janine (whom Thom knows from a previous trip to Sri Lanka) and we board the plane. We have no problem with our ticket or pre-printed boarding pass.

Kenya Air arrival in Nairobi

Janine and I talk a bit to get to know one another and we sleep some as well. It is a five-hour flight. We are served a snack and drinks after take off, and they handed me two bottles of wine (I guess they didn’t want to be bothered when I called for a second.) and two packages of nuts. Before we landed they served us breakfast. So now it’s 23^rd September.

We arrive in Nairobi and get through immigration pretty easily.

I love that it says No Parking and there are all those cars parked.

Maribou Stork. There were flocks of these in Nairobi. They’re HUGE birds. 

We find our way out of the airport and are met by Tom, a driver, who takes us to our hotel. We saw lots of these on our way to the hotel. We are allowed to check-in, freshen up, and then we meet in the lobby to get a taxi and begin our adventure.

Karibu means welcome

We head for the outskirts of town and go to the Elephant Orphanage where we watch the keepers feed some baby elephants of various ages and are even able to touch them.

Wee baby elephant

ostrich at the elephant orphanage

They seem to love wallowing about in the dust and mud, and played in the water buckets. As we were walking out of the orphanage we came across a warthog family just wandering around. We didn’t venture to touch them, but did take some photos.

Warthog family just strolling around.

From there we headed to the Giraffe Reserve. These giraffes are Rothschild Giraffes and we saw them up close and personal.

Rothschild giraffes

Hello!

You have food, I presume.

They had food we could feed to them, and even hold it in our lips and they would “kiss” us to get it. These are the same giraffes that have breakfast with guests at the Giraffe Manor. We looked at it, but it was VERY expensive.

Then we found our way to the Masai Market. It moves from place to place around the city every day.

paintings

carvings

It wasn’t as big as I anticipated, but I bought some earrings, some paintings, a mask, and a makeba (one piece dress with inner ties at the waist). I spent way too much money.

The bargaining begins. (I’m not very good at it.) 

Then we went back to the hotel and I stuck my feet in the pool while Thom soaked in it. Then Janine, Thom and I went to share a pizza and beer.

We change and meet in the lobby to go to Carnivore Restaurant. There are 40 of us on this trip! We pile into vans of 4-7 people. The traffic is horrendous and it takes us an hour to get to the restaurant. We are seated at long tables and a few shorter ones nearby. Then we are served from skewer after skewer of various meats: sheep, lamb, pork, chicken, beef, crocodile tail, and rabbit.

The roasting pit at Carnivore restaurant.

They bring me a tiramisu for dessert with a sparkler in it and sing to me for my birthday.

That’s a sparkler in the tiramisu dessert! 

Traffic is much lighter on the way back and we get home in about 15-20 minutes. In the hotel by 10 on a very sore foot, take a shower, and then bed.