Into the Bush and Beyond

27/06/2024

Every time we go I think it’s fun to focus on one particular aspect of the animals….this time it was rear shots! Butch even captured a human rear capturing an ele rear!!

07/06/2024

Unexpected events sometimes make for the best experiences! While driving back to the lodge from our afternoon game drive, our guide stopped to scan the horizon. When he tried to start it up again, the battery was dead. We tried pushing the vehicle (Malkia stayed in the car!) to no avail so What does any good guide do? Set up the sundowner table while awaiting assistance! Arrived safely back in camp to a blazing fire and a yummy dinner of lamb chops, pork chops, ribs and chicken cooked on a grill with typical Kenyan sides of sukumawiki, chapati, and ugali. A great ending to our two-week adventure!

06/06/2024

Today is our last full day in the bush as we head back to Nairobi to fly home tomorrow. As I mentioned we are in a very small conservancy where wildlife is not prolific but because we are in Kenya, there are always amazing sights. Just being out in the bush, listening to the melodious songs of the birds and watching the animals peacefully grazing puts your heart and mind at ease. The tree that looks white is full of cattle egrets!

06/06/2024

We have moved to a very beautiful place in one of the most northern conservancies in the Mara area. The accommodations are some of the most charming we have ever encountered, decorated by professionals, and the food is outstanding. Lunch was homemade bread, salad from the garden, beet root risotto, squash quiche, and a refreshing pineapple sorbet. Homemade hummus and guacamole for before dinner bitings with sundowners, carrot soup, French green beans in a creamy, thin sauce, and a piece of expertly fried fish! Posting pictures of food and misc rooms!

But, what is wrong with this picture? There are very few animals around us…hippos in the river, a few impala but that is about it. Leaving for a game drive shortly so maybe we will see more but for now, I would be hard-pressed to recommend this as a safari destination….more on that later with a bit of a rant!

05/06/2024

Moving on today. We have been in The Maasai Mara Reserve and are heading north to one of the many conservancies surrounding the Reserve (more on conservancies when I have time). Yesterday we were out all day but gameviewing is very difficult because of the tall grasses. I had hoped to talk about the animals more while here but it is just not happening! More information when we return!

04/06/2024

On safari time now…off at :630, packed breakfast, picnic lunch, back to camp late afternoon. My kind of day. From last night the highlight was 2 lions mating which Butch captured in a video to follow, baboons squawking in a tree, hippos in the Mara river. Of course, followed by sundowners and a campfire!

03/06/2024

The Mara never disappoints! Within 20 minutes of landing we found the females of the Marsh pride lazing under a tree, a field of Cape Buffalo, giraffes enjoying a ground snack, hyena. Water bucks, lilac breasted roller bird and a hippo off in the distance in the infamous Mara River.

03/06/2024

An amazing surprise for us yesterday! Butch and I were quite tired and I told our group leader we would pass on the afternoon cultural visit and sundowners. She got a very pained expression on her face, pulled me aside and said there was no cultural visit but a huge surprise we would not want to miss. 

The surprise was a helicopter ride to enjoy sundowners on the top of a huge boulder overlooking miles of gorgeous scenery! Absolutely an unforgettable experience! Videos later! Just a few scenes from the top. Excuse duplicates…it is early!

02/06/2024

The day dawned bright and beautiful, as usual! We were off for a camel ride and drove about 30 minutes before being let out for a 20 minute walk through the long grass to meet up with the camels. The ride was magnificent, followed by Mimosas, fruit, homemade yogurt, cereal, and eggs cooked to order over an open fire! Currently exhausted but told we must persevere as yet another surprise is in store for us!

01/06/2024

Leaving our new friends at Sarara was hard but we are now at the beautiful Ol Malo House, a bit higher altitude and cooler. A lovely poolside lunch with Gallop, the camp zebra, a refreshing glass of Sauvignon Blanc (home brewed beer for Butch) followed by a Power Nap and we are off for a late afternoon game drive!

01/06/2024

Propped up in bed, cup of coffee in hand(delivered to our cottage, of course!), watching the sunrise and listening to the birds sing. Doesn’t get much better than this! We leave later for another destination so instead of a three-hour walk up a mountain, we chose to relax and enjoy our surroundings! 2 small birds, feeding each other, a hornbill carrying food in its mouth, a hyrax climbing the post, and a baby squirrel scampering across the patio!

The Dawa competition is heating up! Simon, the most gracious bartender here at Sarara, went above and beyond last night to take over first place! When I told him that his creation was superb and would be perfect except it lacked hot chilies, what did he do? He went to the garden, picked a chili or two and made the most delicious Dawa ever! The honey is smokey-flavored here as it comes from acacia trees so the smoke-chili flavor has landed him a solid first place-for now!

The wildlife is not as profuse here but still excellent game drives…lesser Kudu, gerenuks, reticulated giraffe, elephants, vulterine guinea fowl, mama warthog and four babies walking past our room, African crow drinking from our pool, baboons on a boulder……videos of baby eles to follow…wifi still very weak!

31/05/2024

Absolutely the most amazing morning! Up at 4AM to visit the Retiti Elephant Orphanage for the 6AM feeding. We not only were able to watch the babies take their milk but were also driven to the forest area where they spend the morning grazing. Watching them interact with each other and their handlers was so heart-warming and created such a sense of being at one with nature.

Tha beauty of this project, that for me far surpasses the Sheldrick Orphanage in Nairobi, is that it is a community-based project. The women here supply all of the goat’s milk for the babies which gives them much-needed income. All of the workers are local and the milk is pasteurized and mixed with additives right on site. I will put more up after I get home about sponsoring a baby because sponsoring a baby is empowering a woman!

While in the bush with the really young babies, the middle age group of about 15 decided to stop by for an unexpected visit. Chaos erupted as the handlers were trying to calm the older ones who were quite excited to see unexpected visitors! I loved having them brush by us! Internet is bad here so just a few pictures and no videos until we arrive home.

30/05/2024

For those of you familiar with Samburu, we are now in the same general area in a quite remote but beautifully wild location. There is much talk of walks and hikes and horseback riding but not so much emphasis on game drives as the wildlife is mainly giraffes and elephants but I have many previous unshared photos so no worries! Enjoy the scenery as we drove in and our incredibly fantastic room!

30/05/2024

Another beautiful morning in the bush! After Butch’s foray to the clinic, we were a bit concerned about the bill which was charged to the lodge. When we asked the camp manager when we should pay, he laughed and said to just forget it! It was a whooping $3 for the visit and 6 meds!!!!

Moving further into the bush today so I will leave you with bad pictures of the family of lions we met on the road last night as we were heading back to camp as well as our bush dinner. More to come as I haven’t downloaded anything.

29/05/2024

Well, Ernest Hemingway said there was never a day in Africa that he did not wake up happy and I totally agree although today dawned with a bit of trepidation. Butch broke out in a rash yesterday that pretty much covered his body so the camp owners gave him some antihistamines and said if he was not better today they would run him to a nearby clinic. He was no better, but no worse either, so at 6:30 AM 1 vehicle left with 6 people for a bush walk, another 6 went for a horse back safari, I left in my own personal safari vehicle and Butch left for the clinic. Now, I magnanimously said I would be happy to go to the clinic with him but he said no as did the camp owners so no judging here! He was diagnosed with a contact rash of some kind and given an antibiotic, 3 other assorted drugs and a cortisone cream. Happy to report he is better and I had a wonderful game drive as you can see from pictures!

Grevy’s and common zebras mixed together, gray-crowned crane on top of an acacia tree, Beisa Oryx, a road block of rhinos, reticulated giraffes, and elephants galore! More to come but time for a Power Nap!

28/05/2024

A refreshing glass of Sauvignon Blanc and a light lunch of fresh veggies allows me to continue on before our afternoon game drive….an iconic picture of the Lewa landscape and the reticulated giraffe, the candelabra tree mentioned in a previous post, Grant’s gazelles, elephants under an acacia tree and the Cape Buffalo…all on the way to the lodge! Pure magic and heaven!

28/05/2024

We are truly in the bush now in Lewa Conservancy, staying at the amazing Lewa House. Our silver-level guide, Joseph, is a Maasai senior warrior, as noted by his headband and you can tell he loves his job as he stops and says things like, look at the beauty of nature, listen to the birds and their music, enjoy the harmony between the wildlife and their environment. The animal pictures I have yet to download so you will have to be happy with landscapes and the lodge itself for now.

The tree by itself (I forgot it wasn’t on the phone…will be in the group I download) is the candelabra tree that is extremely poisonous for elephants as their stomachs burst after injesting it; however, black rhinos eat it with no issues. If a person touched it and the rubs their eyes, they go blind for a while but recover their sight after a few weeks. Joseph is showing us a leaf off of the sandpaper tree which locals use to make tattoos….ask me no more about that as I am not sure how it works!

And then there is our cottage…lounging outside as I post, watching an ostrich sauntering across the plains. It is truly a marvelous setting! I am relaxing on the blue couch, watching the mountain while Butch is keeping an eye on the water hole!

28/05/2024

A bit remiss yesterday in posting! While at The Emakoko in Nairobi, the camp owner took all of his meals with our group so mealtime turned into a two-hour affair. Doing a bit of a photo dump here of Nairobi National Park wildlife and will go back later to ID any birds! Every year I try to be a bit more creative with my pictures…this year I am going for food in mouth and rear view photos! Please note…the rhinos with the wide mouth are white rhinos while the more rounded mouth is the black rhino.

26/05/2024

Just a short post to catch you up on last evening before heading out for a late afternoon game drive. Arriving at Emakoko, which overlooks Nairobi National Park, was exhilarating and agonizing! The staff from October is still here so there were many hugs and “habari.” After being escorted to our cottage, drinks and snacks arrived which we enjoyed on our private porch. We headed to dinner early to enjoy our first Dawa (we have since learned there is a Dawa competition to see who makes the best among the Bush and Beyond properties. Of course, we agreed to judge!!!). I forgot to take pictures of dinner as I was interrupted by the arrival of the camp bush baby who quickly came to my hand for banana slices!

The agonizing part is seeing the destruction from the flooding. The bridge was rebuilt in 3 weeks but the swimming pool and patio/pizza oven area will take another few weeks. Hearing the stories from the staff are just incredible! Just so thankful none of the staff were hurt!

The river was quite angry this morning and flowing very rapidly as there was rain in Nairobi yesterday which caused the river to rise. It was so loud we thought it was raining! The baboon didn’t seem to mind!

More tomorrow from today with lots of animal sightings!

25/05/2024

Parting is such sweet sorrow! We left for Nairobi this morning after a festive celebration last night for Butch’s birthday and my graduation. The “littles” in the village all arrived, excited to sing and enjoy cake, popcorn, fruit, and punch. Tradition has it that the birthday person cut the cake, eat a piece, and then give everyone else a bite. It was so cute to hear them all sing to us after a practice session on pronouncing our names! Leaving precious memories behind as we head into the next part of our journey!

24/05/2024

24/05/2024

Spent a fun afternoon with Salome experiencing Kenyan culture by not just going to the market but also by riding a pikipiki to get there! Loved the ride with the wind blowing through my hair and the Kenyan countryside passing me by!

24/05/2024

24/05/2024

It’s been quite busy since we landed what with surprising Ernest’s girls (our co-partner), Solana and Maya, and then enjoying dinner with Joy, the “co-collaborator” and source of all data for my dissertation. Wednesday we left for Western Kenya to visit Susan and Salome’s family and of course, we had a royal welcome, arriving in time to meet Yvonne as she was returning from school. It is so lush and green here as well as being quite hilly and reminds us of the Rwandan landscapes from 2015.

Thursday was crammed full beginning with accompanying Yvonne to the bus stop. We walked the short cut which offered some scenic views, quite different from walking to school, US style. Later we visited a non-profit in the area whose US director has Butler connections, Denise Soltis. The Umoja Foundation concentrates on education and supports students in many ways, including just opening a library, Reason 2 Smile. We also visited an orphanage and primary school but I didn’t get pictures there.

This morning we went to Waluka School that I have worked with in the past and where Salome and I would like to start up a library for the school/community. As you can see, the kids love having visitors as much as we love visiting them!

Back to Nairobi Saturday to begin our safari with Bush and Beyond.

21/05/2024

Landing on African soil is exhilarating and completely overrides any tiredness from traveling for 14 hours! Using my Swahili, we sped through Customs and as our bags were being scanned as we exited, one of the scanners looked at me and said welcome back! 😂 I was surprised but then how many “old” ladies with purple streaked hair that speak Swahili do they see in a year? Once outside the terminal, hugs all around as Ernest picks us in our vehicle and then off to savor a chilled glass of Chenin Blanc at my new favorite restaurant, Cultiva. Butch went for a Wagu beef burger with seasoned fries. Ernest opted for the duck leg and I devoured 2 soft-shelled crab sliders. Then it was on to the bookstore before heading to Ernest’s house to surprise Solana and Maya! More hugs all around. Currently waiting for Joy to arrive at our go to hotel, Tamarind Tree!

20/05/2024

What a difference a few hours make! Leaving for Kenya from NYC instead of flying from Indianapolis to JFK on the day of is a game changer! Up at 7 instead of 4 and being rested instead of tired from worrying the alarm wouldn’t go off has made for the perfect start! First of the malaria prevention pills has been taken and we are ready to roll! Next stop-Nairobi!

16/05/2024

Because I am asked so many questions about Kenya and safaris, I decided to create this page where I can not only share pictures but also offer you an “inside” look at being on safari as well as staying with “family” in western Kenya.

Currently, we are sitting at the airport with bags packed for a weekend in New York before heading to Kenya on Monday. No small feat to pack NY clothes and safari clothes in one carry-on!

The other day someone asked what I most looked forward to before traveling which proved to be a quite difficult question because there is no “one” thing. Meeting old friends, making new friends, seeing faces light up when this white person speaks a bit of Swahili, walking down the red dirt road to Waluka School, savoring the local food, especially the fresh fruit and vegetables, finding a new South African wine, listening to the song of the African dove every morning, basking in the silence of the bush while surrounded by wildlife, and, of course, experiencing the excitement of each animal encounter…..it’s all of this that lures me back!

Enjoy a few pictures from past trips before we touch down on Kenyan soil Tuesday and we go into the bush and beyond!