Safari 2022

We flew to Nairobi two days before the scheduled start of our safari to give us time to get a feel for the country.  We went first to the Nairobi National Museum which had animal mounts, skeletons, and some interesting musical instruments, including the Abuu, blown for important ceremonies and for entertainment. 

We drove to Matbronze art gallery, established in 1987, the only bronze foundry in Kenya, and looked over the production of Denis Mathews, the artist.  Deb bought a small bronze pendent of a lion track for US$15, which disappeared soon after. We looked everywhere, and finally accepted that it was lost.  

The next evening, we went to the hotel bar and Deb sat on a padded stool like the stool she had used the night before, looked down, and in the space between the cushion and the rim was her necklace.

We visited a bead factory, where all the workers were women supporting themselves and their children.  Before Covid stopped production, some 300 women were employed; now there were about 50. 

The production line started with women rolling clay to size, then passing the raw balls to women who made holes

who then passed the balls to the next tables for coloring and then other tables until the final product was baked in a kiln, strung, and sold in the shop.

Our driver braved downtown traffic to find a lens cover for the Leica and nail clippers for Deb, so we got a good feeling for public life in Nairobi (crowded─I was told the largest slum in Africa is here).  We found Carnivore Restaurant─all you can eat meats, served on skewers directly from the fire.

We gathered at the Boma hotel with the nine other members of our tour group for introductions and instructions and the next day visited the Karen Blixen house, purchased by Blixen and her husband in 1917. 

After Blixen returned to Denmark in 1931, the house was occupied by several owners until purchased in 1964 by the Danish government and given to the Kenyan government as an independence gift. 

In 1986, after the movie, “Out of Africa,” created tourist interest, the house opened as the Karen Blixen Museum.   

The nearby Giraffe Centre, a 60-acre sanctuary, was established in 1983 to help rescue the Rothschild Giraffe, in danger of extinction.  

According to the Center, there are now more than 300 Rothschild Giraffe safe and breeding in various Kenyan national parks.  One could buy half a coconut shell full of pellets to feed the giraffes.

We stopped at Ocean Sole Africa, an organization that collects flip-flops from beaches and trash and by hand converts them into toys

and other objects, providing jobs and helping the environment.

The next day we climbed into a Toyota Land Cruiser, a four-wheel-drive passenger truck with a raisable roof—the traditional safari vehicle—

to drive through the Aberdares, a mountain range in Kenya’s central highlands, to the Aberdare Country club for lunch.  

In every urban area along the well-paved highway, small businesses 

were set up in the verges, selling goods or providing services. 

             Traffic for the most part was light, with a mixture of small cars, trucks of all sizes, tuk-tuks, and motorcycles.  When a shower arrived, some motorcyclists broke out umbrellas.

As we approached the Country Club, we began to encounter the wildlife we had flown so far to see:   Grants Gazelle, 

                                        warthog.

                                        zebra,

                                        baboon,

                                        and at the club house, peacocks.

The animals provided moving hazards for golfers.

From the club we drove to “The Ark,” advertised as a ”world-famous tree lodge built on stilts,” overlooking a waterhole and salt lick that at night were floodlit.

Since it had recently rained, no elephants appeared, but there were gazelles, water buffalo, and we could sit in comfort behind glass to watch.

A spotted hyena stopped to see if supper was being served, 

While I watched, a Giant Forest Hog came out of the trees.

 

We watched a lovely sunset from the observation deck.

The next day we drove to Lake Naivasha in the Great Rift Valley, 

finding birds and animals along the way, including these two Grey-crowned cranes.  

The lake, the highest point in the Kenyan rift at 6,200 feet,

has an average depth of 20 feet and no outlet. 

On the way, we stopped at a “gift and curio” shop that, according to its sign, was on the equator.  

A local gathered a crowd and demonstrated the Coriolis effect: the theory that water draining from bowls and toilets south of the equator spins clockwise and north spins counterclockwise.  He asked a tourist to place a wood matchstick in the water and

walked ten yards south of the equator, drained the water, then walked ten yards north and repeated.  I did not stay to see him request tips for his performance.  The shop itself was filled with masks, carvings, and other African souvenirs.  Our guide said that they were produced in a factory in Nairobi and another in Mombasa and sold to tourists throughout Kenya.

At the lake, we boarded a skiff to look for interesting birds and animals.  We saw a Yellow-billed egret, 

                                        Marabou storks, 

                                        a Giant Kingfisher,

                                        Great White pelicans, 

and Deb captured a rainbow. 

We saw Fish Eagles perched in trees at the water’s edge.  

Our guide whistled and threw a small dead fish in the water.  An eagle flew down and retrieved it.

 

We booked into the Lake Naivasha Sopa Lodge, a large building with dining area, bar, and comfortable lounges; rooms were in separate structures arranged along walkways stretching away from the main building.  Zebras and gazelles wandered the manicured grounds.

We were warned that after dusk, we had to have a guide to escort us to our rooms.  On our first evening, Deb asked our guide why we couldn’t wander the grounds, “the zebras are not going to attack us.”  The guide aimed his flashlight about thirty yards into the dark: in the trees munching supper was a hippo. 

Hippos are irascible, unpredictable, and—we were told—each year kill more people in Africa than any other animal.  

The lake shore near the lodge was home to a number of them, and each evening the grounds keepers dump lawn clippings for the hippos into an electric fenced area so tourists can snap close-ups in relative safety.

The next day we drove to Lake Nakuru National Park for “game drives,” which involved driving the pitted dirt roads at 20 to 30 miles per hour looking for animals.  We found warthogs, 

                                        baboons,

                                        Grants gazelles, 

and in trees not far off the road, a magnificent white rhino and baby.

The road in Obey Park was somewhat better than most.  

We stopped to observe a troop of Yellow Baboons; 

they stopped to observe us.

                                The lake had pelicans, storks, rhinos, 

                                 and flocks of flamingoes.

We found a Rothschild Giraffe munching Acacia leaves, 

its favorite food, which strikes me as quite a feat,

given the tree's spines.

We found a strangler fig; when the air roots reach the ground, they choke the host tree to death.  According to Warren Glam in Asilia Africa News, natives of East Africa use it in traditional medicine: the bark is used in Imbembe to ensure an easy birth, steeped roots cleanse the blood, and leaves are used in poultices for wounds, boils, warts and other growths.

Thompsons gazelles were everywhere

                                 

as were safari vehicles, at least anywhere animals were.  

Before traveling to Africa, in my imagination the worst experience would be to find animals and me over-whelmed by tourists.  The vehicles were equipped with short wave radios, and when a guide found animals of interest, he radioed his friends, all of whom wanted to keep their clients happy. The result was a race to get to the spot. The animals didn’t seem to mind; only I was annoyed.

These Cheetahs barely raised their heads to acknowledge the horde of on-lookers before settling back to sleep.

Lions reacted the same way.

Even in camp we found fascinating African life: a Superb Starling, 

                                 von Der Decken’s Hornbill,

Lilac-breasted Roller,

 and zebras and gazelles roaming up to the lounge.

We drove to Amboseli National Park which lies below Mount Kilimanjaro which is usually shrouded in clouds; on this day it rose above them.  In the past, we were told, even at the end of winter—the dry season—it would be capped in snow, but climate change….

On our game drives we found Africa as fecund as we could imagine.

                                        Ruppell’s Griffon vultures.

                                       Saddle-billed stork. 

                                        Lesser Kudu.

                                        Egyptian goose.

                                        Sacred Ibis.

                                        Squacco Heron.

                                          Water buffalo with cattle egrets.

                                        And elephants.

                                        

                                        Lots of elephants.

                                            And hippos.

I particularly like Baobab trees, which, we were told, live to be 3,000 years old.

                                                A leopard ignored us.

                                        We saw a civet in the grass,

                                        and more flamingos.

                        Rock Hyrax; its closest relative: the elephant.

                                 Sausage tree.

                     The fruit can be made into a potent drink.

                                        A lioness and cub in the grass.

                        While we watched, the cub went exploring.

                                              A family of cheetahs:

                                            mother, son, and two daughters.

A Candelabra tree—a cactus, its sap is poisonous—

with blossoms at the ends of the stems; grows to 30 feet tall.

We found a pair of Secretary-birds nesting in the top of an acacia tree. 

Carnivores, they generally stomp their prey to death.

We drove to the Ngorongoro Crater, the world's largest inactive, intact and unfilled caldera. The road into the caldera was cobbled by hand; the work took two years.

We stayed at Serena Lodge on the rim.

View from the lounge

and our room.

The floor of the caldera measures about 102 square miles; its rim rises 2,000 feet above the floor to an elevation of 7,500 feet.  The floor is predominantly open grassland, home to an array of animals. We spotted a spotted hyaena with lunch. 

The shallow crater lake has flocks of flamingos. 

We saw our only black rhino, but at a great distance.

And we found a Serval.

With a last view of the crater,

we started the seven-hour or so drive back to Nairobi where we had scheduled an extra day just to make sure we had enough time before the long flights home.