Cooling Down in Kenya

Nairobi, Kenya
1.2921°S, 36.8219°E

Our last week in Thailand, Sarah and I were bitching to each other about the heat pretty regularly.

I know our friends in Boston won’t have any “sorry it’s been too warm” sympathy for us since Boston had its coldest May on record (according to armchair meteorologist Brian O. Clarke), but we were very much looking forward to escaping the sticky, thick air we had been in for the last few months.

Our Kenya Airways flight touched down in Nairobi in the early morning. It was in the low 60’s when we left the airport: no humidity, just cool and breathable air. Kenya had already won our hearts.

We headed from the airport into Nairobi’s downtown, where we had booked a hotel for two nights before heading off for a nine-day safari tour of southern Kenya. We really only had one mission while in Nairobi – find hiking boots. Our Mount Kilimanjaro trek was approaching fast, and Sarah still didn’t have boots while the ones that I bought in a haste in Thailand were already feeling too small.

Fortunately, Sarah was able to find boots, bought from a salesman named Gerald. This Gerald’s luck wasn’t so good. After trips to four different malls, I came to the conclusion that I’d just try to stretch my smallish boots a bit by wearing two pairs of socks and keeping them on my feet during all waking hours. More on this strategy to follow in future posts.

Ready to Safari

Our safari tour of Kenya was amazing, to say the least.

We had an incredibly knowledgable, friendly and funny guide from Natural World Kenya Safaris (thanks Philip!) who taught me more about animals in nine days than I’ve learned my entire life (admittedly this was not a high bar to overcome, although I do know that it’s funny to give dogs peanut butter). Some of the things we learned:

• Male ostriches dance in front of potential mates to help trick them into mating.
• Giraffes give birth standing up, and because they are so tall nearly half of the babies don’t survive the birth.
• Elephants have such a good memory they often return to their place of birth when they die.
• Lions are scary.

We visited five different game reserves and saw cheetahs, elephants, lions, lots of zebras and wildebeest, buffalo, giraffes, crocodiles, hippos, rhinos, hyenas, baboons, and probably two dozen types of birds we had never seen before. Of the “big 5” we only missed out on seeing a leopard.

Sarah couldn’t believe that I was a junior in high school when The Lion King came out, and because I was way too cool for cartoons at that age I didn’t really remember the characters that she and our guide were referencing during our drives. Since I know there are a lot of Lion King fans reading this, I did a bit of research and learned that on our tour we saw Simba, Nala, Rafiki, Ed, Pumbaa, Cheetata, and Ned, but didn’t see Makucha. Next time, Makucha.

Meeting the Maasai

During our trip, our guide Philip offered to take us to one of the villages of the local tribes, the Maasai. The Maasai are a nomadic people located mostly in southern Kenya and northern Tanzania. There are about two million Maasai, and they work mostly as cow, goat and sheep herders.

There is a Maasai language, but many speak Swahili and English as well. The men typically wear red sheets wrapped around their bodies, and always walk with a long stick. Sarah and I had waved to many friendly Maasai faces as we passed by in our safari van, so we were excited to actually see where they lived.

During our village visit, we were greeted with a traditional welcome song and dance – that required our participation – but we first had to meet with the chief to allow us into his village.

We met the local medicine man who showed us the different roots the Maasai use for medicinal purposes and then were taken inside one family’s home. Houses in the village are made mostly with elephant dung, which we learned is a hugely important commodity to the Maasai as it’s also used for making fires. Before we left, the villagers even said a prayer for us to help us on our journey up Mount Kilimanjaro at the end of the month.

The visit to the village was unlike anything Sarah and I have experienced. Fortunately, they encouraged us to take pictures and videos, and we have some great shots of our “day in the village.”

Safari Days

Most of our nine days on safari were spent gazing out of the van in awe at the animals and landscape, and snapping away hundreds of photos. Sarah and I agreed that for this post, it’s probably best to let our pictures do most of the talking. So here are some of our best shots from our Kenya adventure.