A Three Day Safari- So Much Wildlife!!

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Hi guys!

Well I just got back from a 3 day safari to Maasai Mara.  I can't believe all the wildlife we saw!  We left early on Saturday morning.  Going along with us were 4 Japanese tourists.  They were extremely nice and friendly.  This also helped Cate to relax.  She finds the presence of Japanese tourists very reassuring.  When asked why, she claims that you never hear about Japanese tourists being attacked, kidnapped, etc.  I thought for a couple of minutes and couldn't really come up with any examples to disprove her theory.  Anyways, so the 6 of us headed off with our guide at about 9 am after a restful night's sleep.

Along the way we stopped for lunch in a small village.  After a great lunch, we continued on until we reached the park entrance at about 3 pm.  Before I describe all the sights we saw, a brief description of the roads in Kenya is in order.  I truly believe that only in Kenya will you find people off-roading beside the paved road.  The reason: off-roading offers a much smoother ride than the actual paved, yet pothole-ridden, roads.

Day 1:

After getting into the park, our driver popped the roof of our safari jeep and we took off in search of the animals.  We definitely saw our share of zebras and impalas, but the true highlight was seeing the pack of about 20 lions.  There were some mom lions with all of their cubs lying in some bushes.  We got really close, probably about 6 feet away and we had a really good view of them.  Afterwards, we saw some of the lazy male lions dozing away behind some more bushes.  Just when I thought that we had seen all that we were going to, our driver drove us around another bush and we saw more female lions snacking on a recently deceased buffalo.  It was an amzing sight and I got a ton of photos.  By about 5 pm, we were on our way to the camp.  We got to stay in a place that was run by the Maasai people (think red blankets and cut earlobes).  After dinner, some of the Maasai from a nearby village performed a dance for us.  At the end, all the girls were pulled up with them and we got to dance along with them.  One of the Japanese guys got a picture of Cate and I dancing with the Maasai.

Day 2:

After breakfast, we were on the rode by 7:30 am and we spent the entire day in the park.  Some of the highlights include: a sighting of the ever-illusive rhino, a group of vultures and a jackle fighting over the carcas of a zebra, a trip to the hippo and crocodile river (we were actually able to get out of the car and go down to the river, provided an armed ranger went with us), more zebras and impalas, several herds of elephants and giraffes, a leopard sighting, and a couple of cheetahs (silly things move too fast though...).  At about 5 pm, we got to take a trip into the Maasai village.  At that point, it was raining and really muddy.  Typically, mud wouldn't be a problem, but this was mud mixed with cow dung.  The Maasai make all of their houses out of cow dung.  A woman is expected to make the house before she marries (more dirty work for women!).  We got to learn a little more about the Maasai people.  They e nomadic, but on a 9 year schedule (go figure...).  We went into one of the houses.  Small, cramped, smoky, but smelled better than I thought it would.  At this point in our safari we had seen the "Big 5," so we were feeling pretty satisfied at this point.

Day 3:

We left early again and spent the morning in the park.  The day revolved around some more lion, elephant, zebra, and impala sightings.  I never thought that I would get tired of seeing a zebra!  The one highlight was the cheetah sighting.  We actually got to see it hunt and kill an impala.  I love the impalas, so it was hard to watch, but an amazing sight of nature too!  It was really interesting because all of the safari jeeps communicate over the radio.  So whenever there's a sighting, within about 5 minutes jeep after jeep comes along the path or over the field.  It's nice that it allows more people to see more of the animals, but the poor animals never get a break.  With the lions it was almost like a traffic jam of safari jeeps.  Anyways, by the time the cheetah made it's move, about 14 safari jeeps had gathered to watch.  We were on our way back to Nairobi by about 1 pm, which got us to the train station in plenty of time to catch our train to Mombasa. 

I'll write again soon.  Pictures will be added as soon as I'm back in Cairo.

Katie