It's Like Busch Gardens, Only the Animals Will Maul You

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It was a relaxing flight on Air India, from the crazy streets of Bollywood to the even crazier streets of Nairobi, aka "Nairobbery,"  according to Lonely Planet. We're beginning to love these long flights, which give us time to read, free drinks and plenty of room to sleep (never thought I would say that about a 7 hour flight!) It was exciting as we neared Kenya, as we saw the huge expanse of savanna far below us and pictured all the exotic creatures that were roaming below us that we were soon to see, up close and personal.

Nairobi is a crazy city. I know the title says something about Busch Gardens, but this city is nothing like the colorful city in the amusement park, exotic and full of fun games to play. Although, the one thing it has in common with the theme park are the people trying to sell you stuff everywhere you go. "My friend, my friend... remember me? Safari? Market?" etc. etc. etc. These guys chase you all over the city, get your name and will stalk you for the remainder of your time there. You will find dangerous back alleys to avoid them but, sure enough, out they pop, "Kevin! Holly! My friends... How about that safari?" They get a bit of a commission if they bring you to a travel agency. Usually, they just follow you in the door, even though you went there on your own free will. One guy followed us around for about an hour until we bought him a beer, wherein Kevin tried to explain to him the problem we find with traveling, where you can't make many genuine relations with locals because they just see you as walking dollar bills. Let's just say, even three beers later, it didn't get through to him and he asked us for 500 Shillings "for the bus ride home" after the drinks at the local bar "Tacos" - yes, I wanted to go there because it had the Taco Bell symbol under its name... no, it did not have Tacos. Duped again. But, we weren't duped by the local swindler.   

We spent a few too many days wandering around Nairobi trying to plan our safari and spending tons of money at shoddy hotels. Kenya is much more expensive than Southeast Asia and India, mostly because it pulls all the safari tourists from all over the world, spending exorbiant amounts of money staying in lodges and luxury tents (damn them - ha ha). We managed to pull a 12 day camping safari together with Savuka Tours going from Nairobi - Lake Naivasha - Masai Mara - Lake Nakuru down to Tanzania for Lake Manyara - the Serengeti - Arusha and finally the Ngorogoro Crater. No lodges for us, we were roughing it camping style. Very basic camping, which both of us haven't done for a long time, so we were really excited! So we packed up a bag for our safari and were soon to leave the crowded streets of Nairobi, where life doesn't exist after dark. We were tired of having to be in our hotel room after 6 PM for "safety reasons." Although, I did have one weird run-in outside of the Nairobi Central Prison (probably my worst nightmare to be stuck in - you heard these guys screaming from the inside all day like they were being tortured or something!) where this strange beggar woman asked for some money and I shook my head (very politely) saying I don't have anything, where she then SPIT on me! I had goosebumps all over me, it shocked me so much! Somehow, it didn't get on me with my quick jumping reflexes, but Kevin asked her, "What?! Are you crazy?!" I think we had already gotten our answer... 

So we set off on our safari (the Kenyan portion), with our driver Arastas, who, sadly, was your typical "No" guy. He didn't want to say "Yes" to any requests we had. "Arastas, can we try to go down that way?" "No." "Arastas, are we going to see a kill?" "Not this time of year"... but he was always smiling as he said it, at least! It was just Kevin, Arastas and me for Lake Naivasha, where we went to a small little park (with not too many animals) and were able to talk Arastas into taking us to this small campsite we had read about where we hired a boat for an hour to take us out onto the lake. We really wanted to see hippos. "The boat ride is free if you don't see a hippopotamous," our captain said. Now, that's what I like to hear, because you know nothing's ever free in Kenya! Well, we got out on that lake and saw hundreds of hippos. We  quickly realized it may have been a mistake to buy a Tusker (beer) for our captain, as we were quickly surrounded by extremely territorial hippos in our tiny beat-up old boat. They were so close, and their eyes never left ours, unless they went underwater, which seemed a cause for concern. One little hippo bump, and we were hippo food. But, alas, we survived and transported safely back to our hotel. Yeah, we were put up in a hotel in Naivasha, according to Lonely Planet: "There is no conceivable reason to stop in Naivasha unless you are picking up supplies along your way." Yup, we were placed in a stopover dump, as much as we wanted to camp. The only thing I think Arastas said "yes" to the whole trip was when I asked if Naivasha was very dangerous. Home sweet home... for only the night, thank god.

We met up with our group that was going to be accompanying us to Masai Mara and Lake Nakuru. Two young Dutch guys who were always hysterically laughing, Pascal and Robert, a Canadian woman, Laura, living in Argentina and David from San Francisco, living in Kenya for the past year and a half starting an orphanage. We were excited to have the company with us, despite the crowded van. We spent two nights in the Masai Mara, which is the savanna where the annual wildebeest migration takes place. You've all see the pictures of millions of wildebeest getting grabbed by crocs crossing the river of the Masai Mara during the migration, and it also is how Mufasa gets trampled in the Lion King (ha ha - I'm not laughing at his death, though, just the childish description). We were on safari during the wet season, so it was a lot more beautiful than the dry season, with all the foliage, but apparently there aren't as many animals... I would have to disagree. We saw a ton! Our first afternoon in the Masai Mara ended up being the most exciting day of our whole safari. We watched a cheetah hide her fluffy little furball of a cub away in the bushes and anxiously watched the entire buildup as she prepared to make a run for a group of impalas 500 meters away. Now, I don't know if you can picture how fast "the fastest land animal" can run, but from the moment she set off for the kill to the moment she got to the herd of impalas 400  meters away, was just that, a moment. She was definitely running at her peak of 70 MPH, with 23 foot strides. Even though she came back, empty handed (3 out of 4 cheetah hunts fail) to her hungry baby, being able to watch a cheetah at her fastest is quite rare to see , and seeing the way those impalas fled in every direction out from the trees (even though they knew she was lurking) was unreal. David had seen lion kills right in front of his truck on safari andf said that it didn't even come close to comparing to this. It's one way to start a safari, getting the adrenaline pumping. These cheetahs work their bodies so hard when they run these short sprints at such high speeds, that their bodies reach dangerously high levels and it is even possible that their vital functions can close down after too far of a run. Watching her sluggishly walk back to her hungry cub was a sad sight to see, but it's the way of the Animal Kingdom. Hopefully next time...

We didn't stay in tents in Masai Mara, either, but in small cement structures with beds inside. The occasional bat or 10 could be found lurking inside and it isn't rare to have red ant invasions in the middle of the night, as the rest of our group found out one night... It was an interesting campsite. We had some Europeans with small children  staying on the same grounds. These people would be up at 5 AM before a game drive drinking out of a bottle of Jim Beam at breakfast. That's one way to start a morning safari, I guess.

The hilltribe people spread all over the savanna are the Massai people. They are nomadic and live in small mud huts, living off mainly blood, meat and milk. What interesting people! And the jewelry they make... don't get me started. Massai jewelry is beautiful - intricate colorful beadwork. You see the Massai people all over the plains herding their cows all day long. Their lives revolve around keeping their livestock alive. Hey, the more cattle a man has, the more wives he can have... Some Massai people came into our campsiteone night to dance for us (at a cost). It was really interesting, although not the most authentic performance I've ever seen. They may have done this once or twice before for tourists.

So, the Masai Mara was great. We saw elephants, lions, cheetahs, hippos, buffalo, hyenas, Thompson Gazelles, wildebeest... you name it. And of course many "Gawkerbeests" (other tourist vans and SUV's spotting game drives) - they really are a species of their own. At some points, we weren't looking for animals anymore, but for the Gawkerbeests, because you know wherever they are, there has to be some cool animal lurking around!

David and Laura didn't stay for the Lake Nakuru leg, but we planned to stay with David at his place outside of Nairobi when we were done with our safari, and he was so nice to let us use his awesome binoculars. They helped with some camera tricks. :) Extreme close-up? So, it was us and the Dutch boys for Lake Nakuru, Land of the Mosquitos... but so beautiful. Lake Nakuru is filled with millions of beautiful pink flamingos and is home to rhinos, monkeys and other animals. We saw the white rhino there, as well as our first dead carcass! Yes, that was even exciting to us... Really, there is nothing like Lake Nakuru early in the morning. It is absolutely stunning.

Then it was a little change of plans due to the weather and we headed back to Nairobi (showers!!!! - we hadn't showered for days, I hate to admit) before we set off on our Tanzanian leg of the safari.