Our driver Joseph and safari company rep Ann met us at Rosslyn Academy promptly at 8 am. We were so excited to be off on this great adventure! As we drove through Nairobi, huge Marabou storks were on on lampposts, signposts, and telephone poles in downtown Nairobi. These huge birds are scavengers and eat trash all over the city. It was an odd sight!

We passed the Parliament building and square where Kenya’s first president is buried; it’s lined with flags and no photographs of the area are allowed.

We had our first experience with Kenyan police…. and their reported corruption—they stopped our driver and pressured him for money. He didn’t budge. The two officers, one female, and one male, got frustrated and waved us off. I knew that that Joseph was awesome.

We drove south on Mombasa Road, which leads directly to Mombasa, Kenya, some 8 hours away. We passed concrete and steel mills. A massive new train line from Nairobi to Mombasa is being built, with an extension west to Uganda and on to southern Sudan. It is an elevated line that will allow wild animals (even tall giraffes) to migrate under it.

Not far outside Nairobi we saw our first giraffes! It’s almost the equivalent of seeing deer or cattle back in the US.

Joseph told us that an eruption about 100 years ago occurred on Masai land in the Chyulu Hills. This eruption killed many Masai, who now call the area Shetani, a name for their evil spirits. Hell’s Gate is also part of the eruption area and is found in Tsavo West National Park.

Even though we didn’t visit that park, volcanic stones were scattered all over the area we did drive through. Kenya has an amazing amount of mountains, extinct volcanoes, and calderas.

African massage

The final 20 km of the road into Amboseli was unpaved and rutted. Little did we know that this was to be the norm for the next 10 days. My guesstimate would be that only 10% of Kenyan roads are paved. Some aren’t even graded. Joseph calls it the African massage.

First experience with tented camps

Our first two nights’ stay were in Kibo Tented Camp. So, here’s the thing: I’ve only really camped maybe twice in my life. It’s not my thing. It wasn’t something my family did. I endured it in Girl Scouts.

That all said, Kibo was nice. Not what I’d call hard-core camping, but still a new experience for me. The tents were nice, large and roomy with mosquito nets around each bed. The camp runs on generator power only, so the hours of actually having electricity were limited. Nice hurricane lamps with candles worked just fine.

Kibo Tented Camp

It was quite warm, so Laura and I sat out on our porch and enjoyed the breeze, looking straight out at Mount Kilimanjaro. Our camp is named for Kibo, which is the highest peak on Mt Kilimanjaro.

Joseph picked us up at 4 pm for first game drive. It was beyond amazing; we saw a lion, lioness, wildebeests, yellow baboons, giraffes, and so many elephants. Some of the elephants we saw today were 1-2 weeks old.

 

 

Joseph picked us up at 4 pm for first game drive. It was beyond amazing; we saw a lion, lioness, wildebeests, yellow baboons, giraffes, and so many elephants. Some of the elephants we saw today were 1-2 weeks old.

The evening back at the camp was quiet. It was dizzying looking up at the stars. I’ve only seen the Milky Way once before (in Iceland), but this was beyond description. So clear. It was remarkable to see the Milky Way practically from horizon to horizon.

Did you know?

• Big cats eat grasses for the folic acid

• Elephants and giraffes will follow hyena scat and eat it to get the calcium from bone remnants
• Elephants eat tree bark for digestion
• Elephants are right-tusked or left-tusked