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Kenya X – Safari II

We had yet another early morning, 6:15 to go on a walk around the camp. Mathias, our guide pointed out many amazing details like footprints from Hippo, Impala, Porcupine, Giraffe and Mongoose, who had all moved during the night! We had breakfast, looking up at Kilimanjaro in the sunrise.

Once we had packed, we started travelling to the Taita Hills Game Lodge. It was a lot more “African” than the other hotels, which was nice. We also had our own balcony! We went for an evening game drive, where we saw even more animals, including Elephants, Giraffe, Buffalo, Wilderbeast, Gazelle, Kudu, Water Buck, and African Starlings, which are a dazzling blue colour! We were in the park for 2½ hours before we had to turn back to go to the lodge.

That night, we were just getting ready for bed, when we heard a noise. There were elephants at the water hole! We went down and spent about an hour watching them, about 4 herds, and about 100 elephants. It reckon it was the highlight of the holiday!

Kenya IX – Safari I

Got up at 4:45 this morning, to be ready to leave for our safari. The journey took 5 hours, heading out to Tsavo West, we stopped in the town of Voi to stretch our legs. We headed off again, and the road rapidly deteriorated, until it was nothing more than a dirt-track.

About 20km before we arrived at the Ziwani Tented Camp, we spotted some elephants down a side road. Halisi, our driver changed direction, and we approached. Suddenly, on of the elephants started charging. Luckily we outran the Elephant, which then left us alone. As we approached the camp, we saw a giraffe run across the road, right in front of us! I feel that giraffe are graceful to begin with, but even when it was rushing across the road, it was still really graceful about it!

At Ziwani, we stayed in tents, but unlike any tent I had ever seen before! Tiled floors, showers, and electricity, and hot water from 6pm to 10am. After lunch, I was so tired, I slept until 4pm. I got up, and then got ready for our night safari. We left for the night safari at 7pm, by which time it was already dark. Being close to the equator means that Kenya has very similar length days, almost 12 hours of day to 12 hours of night. We hadn’t left the camp before we saw a bush baby! We drove out onto the landing strip and set off on the journey. We saw some Genet cats, which are roughly the size of a domestic cat, hunting. We saw hippos out of water, and another herd of elephants. A bit later, we came across the “Elephant Highway” an ancient corridor with thousands of ripped up trees, where the Elephants travel along.

When we got back to the camp, some Maasi warriors arrived and demonstrated to us two dances, one for circumcision, and one for weddings. Then one of them explained to us the Maasi culture, like how they drink blood mixed with milk to get food when they can’t kill their cows. They also told us how they believe that all cows belong to the Maasi, and if they steal them, they are only taking them back!

Kenya VIII

Didn’t do very much today, not even sunbathing, because my shoulders are still burnt. They’re getting better, but it’ll take a while before I go back in the sun.

Kenya VII

Got up quite early this morning, at 6:30 to prepare for our trip into Mombasa. We had breakfast, and then met Morris our driver. He took us to the Akamba wood carving factory, via the ferry port. The ferries were huge, and were filled to the brim with people, cars, matatus (the local public transport), and carts. How no-one is crushed, I don’t know!

The wood carving factory was fascinating! Each carver works in his own area, carving either wood or soapstone. We also saw drums being made form goat and cow skin. Women also help, by doing painting and finishing of the items. All produce is sent to the show room, and the carver gets a 70-30 split. Every item has an individual number on it, linking every item back to the carver who made it. I bought an african mask, which I’m going to hang on my wall.

Next we went to the Old Town, where we visited the old Portuguese Fort Jesus, which was shaped to look like a person! The guide wasn’t very good, and was a bit mumbly. He ushered us into a shop, where he obviously got some extra money for bringing more trade. We moved on to a spice market, where a trader showed us all of the different spices and herbs, which we told him we couldn’t buy because we can’t take food back to Britain. Because it’s Ramadan at the moment, and most of the Old Town’s residents are Muslim, many cafés were closed, or nearly empty.

Tonight, because our Hotel seems to think it’s actually a ship, we were “sailing on the high seas” meaning that all of the food was more normal. The evening’s entertainment, the Mombasa Roots Band, were quite good with many people dancing to them. Matt went off with some friends he’d made, and the next time we saw him, he was dancing with them to the band!

Kenya V

Today we decided that because the weather was better, we would go to the “Haller Park” which is on the land that belongs to the local Bamburi cement factory. Our guide showed us around, and explained that the whole Park is an ecosystem, with the vast majority of the animals feeding themselves. He also showed us many plants which have popular uses, including one which smelled of citronella, which is often used to unblock noses, especially in small children.

The park has built itself up over the past 40 years, and is almost entirely natural, inside a quarry. We saw hippos, crocodiles, and giraffes being fed. We also saw buffalo, monkeys and a 130 year old tortoise. The park has no lawnmowers, because there are so many tortoises eating the grass!

This evening we watched an acrobatic group performing tricks like limbo under a bar of fire, and fire eating too, they called on a member of the audience for the fire eating, and I wish that it was me, because I would love to do that!

Kenya IV, Part II

I’m sitting awake in bed now, with Matt fast asleep, because of the night’s adventures.

I was awoken abruptly by a loud knocking on the door to our room! I tried to ignore the “intruder” in the hopes that they would go away. The knocking only intensified, so I went to wake my brother to open the door with me. Scarily, he wasn’t in his bed! As I went to open the door, the phone rang, startling me. I answered the phone with a quiet “Hello?” to be greeted by Matt’s tired voice asking to be let in. It transpired that Matt had managed to let himself out of our room, make his way down the corridor, and then wake up. I let him in, and he went straight to sleep.

Kenya IV, Part I

It was still overcast today, but because it wasn’t raining any more, we still went snorkelling. We saw more of the social differences in Kenya, with one of the many houses along the coastline belonging to the president’s uncle.

We got to a location near a reef, where we went snorkelling. The water was unfortunately quite murky, meaning that we couldn’t see very many fish at all. When we got out, the wind picked up, so I got very cold then! We went further out to the reef, where we had lunch, because the tide was low, exposing the top surface for landing. We went rock-pooling and saw brittle starfish; sea urchins; a clam, which we tricked into closing on a stick; and a tropical star fish!

At dinner, we talked to our waiter, George, who was a very intelligent man, fluent in 5 languages: English, Swahili, German, French, and his Mother Tongue. He was very interesting, and told us that there are 42 different tribes in Kenya, and each has it’s own language. However, everyone in Kenya is (at least) bilingual, because they also speak Swahili.

Kenya III

Today was quite windy, so it was a better idea to sit on our covered balcony and read a book. I started mine, and then started organising my photos. I am determined to have a well catalogued and searchable collection of photos from this holiday. From the photos so far, it looks like I get about 150-200 photos a day that get kept, meaning about 2100 for the whole holiday!

In a break from the rain, one of the hotel workers started cutting fresh coconuts, which we decided to have. They were lovely, but I discovered that I don’t actually like coconuts all that much. Not long after that, we saw a wedding nearby. Unfortunately it was raining, even though the bride and groom had travelled so far for good weather!

Kenya II

First full day in Kenya! We’ve spent it just lazing around by the pool, and I’ve learned that I’m not that great at putting on suncream, to be honest. I have two lovely patches of redness across the front of my shoulders, from the only place that I didn’t think to put suncream.

Luckily, my shoulders aren’t as bad as my auntie’s arm. A branch from a palm tree fell off in strong winds and hit her! She has one of the biggest bruises I have ever seen. It’s probably as big as an outstretched hand, and is bright purple!

There was a lovely show tonight with many different acts, including belly dancing and some boys doing a voodoo dance. Mum got invited up to do some dancing with the African dancing group, which was quite funny! We finished off the evening by dancing with the “Animation Team” which was quite fun!