samburu, kenya

After years of dreaming about it, plans made and canceled, we finally made it to AFRICA! The next few posts will represent our trip.

We flew non-stop from San Francisco to Dubai, then hopped from Dubai to Nairobi. In Nairobi, we met our safari guide and mates.

Maureen & Gareth- Scottish professors

Trina & Henning- mother-son duo from Norway (she's in the foreign service)

Jonathan- a British accountant turned volunteer/diver in Tanzania

Emile- our intrepid guide who is the modern face of Africa

Richard- our driver & worth his weight in gold

Isaac- the amazing cook

3 more crew members that made our trip easier and more pleasant at every turn

Samburu, Kenya
Our first stop was the northern game park of Samburu. It was a bone jarring ride across Kenyan 'highways' to the park but when we got there... wow (our over-used superlative throughout the trip). The park is very dry and dusty but the animals there were abundant. Many animals that are not found anywhere else are found in Samburu: Grevy's Zebra (fine striped), Reticulated Giraffe (fine stripes, again), Gerenuk (long necked gazelle) and Oryx (an entirely desert animal).

Our camp at Samburu was fenced in by an electric fence but there were still pumba (warthogs) all dik-dik (mini-mini-deer, think the chihuahua of deer) along with lots of birds. The best part about this park is that there are not many tourists around and it felt as though we had the place entirely to ourselves.

We also had the unique opportunity to visit a Samburu village (related to the Masai). How these people scrape out a living on this unforgiving land and still seem so joyful and happy is nothing short of a miracle.

lake nakuru, kenya

Lake Nakuru is mainly known for it's large population of flamingos that cover the lake and making it shimmer with pink. We were able to actually get out of the vehicle and walk along the shore of the lake. The low din of the flamingo chatter and wing fluttering was unforgettable. It felt like there was a distance maintained between us and them as they slowly shifted as we moved along the shore. (You can see this lake featured in Out of Africa as the one that Robert Redford and Merryl Streep flew over.)

Also at Lake Nakuru were white rhinos. The rhinos move in family groups with their heads down, mowing down the grass as they lumber along. We were able to get incredibly close to these prehistoric animals (enough to hear them snarfle and grunt).

masai mara, kenya

"there's always action on the mara.." - Emille

Emille said this quote over and over again and he couldn't have been more accurate. The big cats we'd been waiting to see were abundant here. Within 10 minutes of entering the park we came upon an idyllic scene of a pride of lions sitting peacefully under a tree. We were able to get so close to them that it was a little uncomfortable.

Our camp at Masai Mara was what we had imagined a camp in Africa to be. Our water hearter was a large oil drum over a fire, bathrooms were gleaming white toilets in a tin shack... it was all perfect. The camp was guarded 24 hours a day by 3 Masai guards as there had been problems with hyena and lions coming into camps for snacks.

It was at Masai Mara where we got to see one of the natural wonders of the world: the wildebeest migration. We saw hundreds of thousands (maybe millions?) of wildebeest across the savannah. The lions that accompanied the migration were so over-full they didn't really even bother to eat their kills. And there wasn't just impressive numbers of wildebeest, there were also thousands of zebra and antelope that came as well. It was such an overwhelming sight that we actually couldn't photograph it and gave up to instead just watch and enjoy the sight.

Some other sights at Masai Mara were:

• hippos in the Mara river


• a cheetah hunt (teaching her young cubs to hunt)


• Nile crocodiles in the mud


• a leopard in a tree with his kill (relaxing in an abandoned vulture nest)


• ostriches, elephants, giraffes & flocks of tourists

Again, we were able to visit a local village and were invited to also visit their school. 70 students to a classroom and one teacher... wow.

the mara part 2

goodby to kenya

 

From Masai Mara, we drove back to Nairobi. We said a fond farewell to our trip companions and prepared for the 2nd leg of our trip. We caught a very dusty bus across the border to Arusha, Tanzania where we met up with our new (larger) safari group. In our vehicle were:

• Annette & Christian- vacationing Norweigans


• Francis & Andrew- brother and sister Australian (Sri Lankans)


• Lee- a young British guy from Essex on a big adventure before starting university


• Deo- our guide


• Sammy- another amazing driver


• crew & staff that always made me a gluten-free option to dinner

There was another vehicle of tour-mates but they made little-to-no effort to respond to our overtures of friendship.. but we didn't care.