Lion, leopards, and cheetahs, oh my! (and there were horses too)

I have just finished a fantastic week on safari in Kenya. We visited 3 national parks: Samburu in northern Kenya, Lake Nakuru in central Kenya and the Masai Mara at the very south of Kenya. Each park had very different environments and animals within. The safari involved camping to be close to the nature of the reserves. Unlike my last trip to Africa, there has been no "participatory" involved at all. Our camp sites had permanant tents and for the Masai Mara we even had tents with beds that were surrounded by a tropical garden. We got driven around in these little vans where each person had a window seat, and the roof popped up to get a 360 view. We would drive to the camp sites, and dinner would be ready for us. We didn't have any cleaning up to do --so basically we got catered to, and our only concern was finding all the animals we wanted see. I definately reccomend the lazy camping safari!

Samburu was the first game park we visited, and to get there we crossed into the desolate land of northern Kenya. Northern Kenya is another world --think dry, dusty scrub land that once was the land of highway bandits and gun runners from Somalia. There are 2 northern tribes that have pretty much been forgotten by the rest of Kenya --the Samburu and Turkana. We visited their villages and these people live in huts made of sticks and mud tied together with strips of acacia tree bark. The floor in the huts is dirt and animal skins, and the ceiling is so low that I had to bend in 1/2 to fit inside. The kindergarten class that serves several villages is basically a dirt area surrounded by acacia branches with one Samburu volunteer teacher. We saw some of their traditional dances and since I was wearing their warrior color, red, I got picked to dance with them. The people wear bright colors with lots of beaded plates around their necks and ears stretched so wide that their ear lobes dangle nearly to their shoulders. These people couldn't be more different from us --- male and female circumsion is a tradition at the age of 14; once circumsized, boys go live an isolated life in the mountains for 10 years, while girl are ready for marriage. Men have 4+ wives --the number of wives depending on how many they can afford (cows or goats is the payment) and whether wife number 2 gives the ok. They use stick and brush to light fires and food is cooked over 3 stones in their tiny huts. The only thing these people eat is meat (goat and cow), milk and blood. We actually watched them do a blood-letting of a goat --the blood filled a communal cup from which they drank.

In the Samburu game reserve I saw an animal that I had never seen before --the gerenuk. It is a slender deer-like creature that kind of looks like a mini-giraffe. It stands on its hind limbs to eat from the bushes (which is a really cool sight to see). The park was full of dik-dik, the smallest antelop that is super delicate-looking and about the size of a large domestic cat. We found a herd of female elephants with really small babies eating acacia trees and actually got quite close to them. We also saw cheetahs running away from lions that were on the hunt (the lion tried to catch a warthog, but their hunt was unsuccessful). Samburu park is also home to the northern five --five types of animals that only exist in northern East Africa; the Reticulated giraffe (has distinct hexagonal spots), Grevy's zebra (which is looks like a hybrid between a donkey and a zebra), the Somali ostrich (has blue legs), Besia oryx (which has a paler coat that the usual oryx) and the gerenuk. The male lions here also have no mane! This is an adaptation to the heat in the north. We were camping inside the park and since baboons would often try to raid the camp we had a designated baboon guard. At the top of the guard's tent was his trophy baboon skull from this one baboon that just wouldn't stop attacking the camp. On night we were eating fish and I had a serval (type of wildcat) almost jump up on the table where I was sitting to get to the fish!

We spent a day in Lake Nakuru, which has a large alkaline lake that is home to millions of flamingos. We got to walk right up to the water's edge to see both the lesser (pink) and greater (white) flamingos, along with plenty of pelican and spoonbill storks (their beaks are in the shape of a wooden cooking spoon). In this park there were plenty of rhinos --we got really close to 3 sleeping white rhinos, but also saw the elusive black rhino in the distance. We also saw some tree climbing lions!! It was a female lion perched up in an acacia tree. Lions that climb trees are quite a rare thing and this adaptation (to spot prey and avoid biting safari ants) has only occurred in very few places. We stopped at a mountain-top viewing point that allowed us to see the entire park and lake, and also had a stop at a waterfall that I was able to walk behind. At lunch we were severely raided by the vervet monkeys, which locals call the 'black-faced devils' because of their clever ways of stealing food from humans.

And finally the Masai Mara. This park is on the migratory route of 1.6 million wildebeast, 400,000 gazelles, and 200,000 zebras. In this park these animals cross the treacherous waters of the Mara river where a host of crocodiles await them. The main reason for doing this safari was to see this migration....and did I see it? Well, sort of. I saw 1000's of wildebeast and other migratory animals milling about ---but not millions, and none of them crossed the river. I actually paid to do a balloon safari (450 dollars, yes balloon safaris are a total money racket) hoping to see the migration from above and because I had fond memories of the ballon ride Dave and I had done in the Serengeti (where we saw a cheetah and lions in action), but the winds were so low that day that the ballon didn't take us very far and we saw next to no animals. But the Masai Mara wasn't all that disappointing, since we saw many cheetahs up close, a big pride of lions that included the dominant male lion (father of all the cubs in the pride), and 2 leopards sleeping the trees. The best sighting was of a bunch of 1 month old baby lions playing with their older (3 month old) brothers and sisters. Perhaps it's because of how much I like horses, but on this trip I am really liking the prey animals --topis with coats that have 5 different shades of brown, hartbeest that have heart-shaped horns and the thompson's gazelles that are constantly wagging their tails.

Oh yes, and there were horses. I will finish this post by telling you that I managed to find a horse ranch in Kenya. Horses are expensive and require a lot of maintenance, so they are very few around East Africa. But yes, I did find some and went for a horse ride too. The campground we were staying at next to Lake Nakuru National Park was also right next to a ranch that had 37 race horses. Less than 10min after arriving to the campground I went to the ranch, got the full tour and met all the horses. Plus, on the days we were there I would get up extra early to watch them exercise the horses and break-in the new ponies. After one of the game drives, me and the girl I am sharing tents with (Maleka, from Owen Sound Ontario), went for a ride by the fence surrounding the park (on the human-side of the fence that is). Since I knew how to ride they gave me a more advanced horse, which initially I was told was a 'mare' that was recently retired from the race track. On the ride I found a good spot to canter with the horse. Things were going so well that I decided to see what the horse could do and went for a bit of a gallop. The horse moved so beautifully --it was honestly like riding the Ferrari of horses. After galloping I was informed that I had actually heard wrong and the horse I was riding was actually a male, in fact a stallion! Stallions are known to be crazy loose cannons, so I was a bit shocked. As it turns out this was one of the few non-crazy ones that had won many races and was being bred because of good tempermant. So this was not only my first time galloping a race horse, but a stallion too. Yes, I am a horse-nerd.