Kenya - Nairobi

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We have realised during our time here that there must be some area of our brains that has succumbed to the belief that there is little or no food to be had in Africa so as soon as we hit anywhere with a population of more than 20, with at least one eatery, we get stuck in. Nairobi was to be no exception and we spent most of our three days there esconsed in Jave House eating until we literally could not move. Literally!

Eating is always a pleasure but we did have some concerns: a) would our girths grow exponentially, as our appetites seemed to be doing; b) could we finance such culinary extravagance; and c) if we continued to eat until we could not move, how would we reach the levels of speed necessary to escape the muggers, murderers and marauders that allegedly haunted every Nairobbery street corner.

Although you certainly need to take care in Nairobi, we actually found it to be really pleasant and would go so far as to say we were really relaxed there. I'm not saying that the high crime figures are massaged by some strange civil servant with a penchant for damaging tourism, but it really isn't all that bad. Instead of muggers on every corner we were plagued, however, but the many touts who are desperate to sign you up to a tour. There were two particulary persistant ones outside our residence (the Terminal Hotel) who did not seem to realise that breathing alcohol fumes over us was perhaps not the best way to get business.

Nairobi National Park is home to the David Sheldrick Wildlife Sanctuary, which looks after orphaned rhinos and elephants and rehabilitates them for release into the wild. We were absolutely delighted to discover that members of the public can go along for the one hour lunch  time feeding slot and then had our hopes dashed when we arrived only to find that it was the flamin' animals that were to be fed.

Actually the place is just great and it is a rewarding but bizarre experience to watch the baby rhino orphan trot in with its 'mother' (actually its human carer) and down 5 huge bottles of special lactogen milk. When the rhino is finished, and the hoards of Americans feel they have been sufficiently loud, the rhino trots off into the Nairobi National Park for the afternoon and the elephants arrive for lunch. The rhino never comes into contact with the elephants so that they do not learn to associate them as playmates as they do not mix in the wild.

The orphanage has 10 baby elephants at the moment and they all sped into the feeding area in a neat line, like something straight out of Dumbo, but without the flying. We were surprised to see some of them had blankets on and even more surprised to hear that this was because one of them had sunburn (sunburn, on an elephant!) and to protect the others against pneumonia, which is actually the biggest elephant killer.

Some of the elephants' mothers had died of natural causes whilst others were the victims of poachers but they all had a sad story to tell (so no flying but a bit of narrating - not bad for an elephant eh). The elephants' human 'mothers' actually sleep in the same stable as the elephants at night as they are extremely sociable creatures. The mothers have to be rotated (not by the elephants) daily however as the babies get so attached. One baby elephant got so attached to its human mother, who had looked after it for months, that when the lady went on holiday the baby refused to eat or let anyone else look after it and actually died.

One thing you really do learn on these animal trips is how they display such human behavioural traits sometimes. I'm not talking about how they played with a football or rolled over on the rubber ring, or even how they like a cuddle. No, what I'm referring to is the fact that some animals, just like some people, just love to be centre of attention. So it was pretty difficult concentrating on the elephant hard luck stories whilst there was a couple of baboons having a shag just behind.

Realising we weren't going to get fed at David Sheldrick, we went on to the giraffe sanctuary, which is breeding the endangered Rothschild giraffe for release into the wild. It's not such a conservation experience as at David Sheldrick but great nonetheless and you get to personally feed the animals, which gave us more than a sporting chance of nicking a giraffe pellet.

First you are taught how to feed them with one hand, then two hands, with your arms crossed. Inevitably, the keeper then decides whether you are up for a bit of animal humiliation and teaches you how to feed them from your mouth. So there I am, with a giraffe pellet in between my lips whilst a 5m giraffe tries to whip it out (the pellet that is) with its unbelievably long and rough tongue (which is antiseptic by the way so actually more hygienic than kissing Chris). Meanwhile, Chris is trying to get a photo and keeps 'missing' so I am there for 10 pellets worth of feeding and walk away the first person to get stubble rash from a giraffe.

All animaled out, we headed back towards Nairobi via the Bomas. The Bomas is a cultural centre where you are treated to the dances and song of 11 of the 43 different Kenyan 'tribes'. The atmosphere in the huge circular building where the spectacle takes place must be fantastic in the high season but as we were the only two people watching for the first half hour we felt slightly conspicuous and more like we were on show rather than the dancing troupes. Although more people arrived to watch things got rather more uncomfortable as audience participation loomed ever nearer and first me, then Chris, was pulled up to dance and prove once and for all that most Mzungus simply can't gyrate whilst standing. In fact during Chris's turn he had to be rescued by a kindly dancer who realised his colleague was over-stretching Chris with his moves and encouraged him instead to repeat a few simple moves consisting of moving your head from side to side - slowly.

And after another day's eating ourselves immobile the next day, that was it. For the next 10 days we were to join a tour down to Zanzibar. A brief respite from the rigours of independent travel.