My new reality

We said goodbye to 6 of our Odysseys Unlimited group with whom we had spent an amazing 2 weeks on game drives in Kenya and Tanzania.  Early Thursday morning the remaining 4 of us boarded our jeep with our driver Reuben for the 4 hour drive to Nanyuki, north of Nairobi, in the shadow of Mt. Kenya.  On our way out of (and later, back into) Nairobi, we drove through lots of urban sprawl and through a extremely populated housing district.  Roadside open air market stalls covered with tin roof or tarps, sold clothing, produce, furniture, toilets, caskets, stuffed animals, and pool tables.  All the useful stuff.  This area, though still ‘rustic’ seems more affluent as houses become bigger and the highway is paved.  There were a few shopping malls but no Maasai.  Cows still grazed between the guardrails. 

Onto Nanyuki and Mt. Kenya.  Mt. Kenya is an extinct volcano and the second tallest mountain in Kenya at 17,000 ft.  But first, more animals. We stopped at Ol Pejeta Conservancy, a 140 sq mile area that houses elephants, leopards, lions, zebra, and giraffes in the wild. And… Rhinos!  At the conservancy they are working to increase the numbers of endangered black rhino.  They also house the last 2 northern ‘white’ rhinos, both female.  ‘White’ actually refers to the Dutch word ‘wijd’ meaning wide, not white.  Their mouths are wider than black rhinos and both are colored grey. We saw many rhinos fairly close up.  Also within the conservancy there is the Sweetwater Chimpanzee Sanctuary which seeks to provide lifelong refuge to orphaned or abused chimps.  While chimps are not native to Kenya, an agreement with the Jane Goodall Institute located the Sanctuary here within the Conservancy.  Some stories of abuse were so sad.  Donations can be made through the Ol Pejeta website https://www.olpejetaconservancy.org/wildlife/chimpanzees/sweetwaters-chimpanzee-sanctuary/

We spent about 5 hours at the Conservancy where we saw all the ‘usual suspects’- zebra, antelopes of every flavor, reticulated giraffe, our favorite- elephants, and the rhinos- black and white.  We stopped at an enclosure where Baracka, a blind black rhino lives.  We were able to pet and feed Baracka who lost one eye to an injury and the other to cataracts.

We then headed another 45 min to our hotel, the fabulous Fairmont Mt. Kenya Safari Lodge.  It’s remarkable to drive on rough roads and through tiny villages and fields past hordes of uniformed school children walking home from school to a refined, luxurious resort.  On the Equator.  We marvelled at the sight of quiet colonial elegance after 2 weeks of dust and jostling.  Manicured lawns, strolling peacocks, resident monkeys, pool, tennis, golf, horseback riding.  You can imagine ladies in white linen with parasols and gentlemen with panama hats and khaki shorts strolling the grounds. The Safari Lodge was owned by actor William Holden and other investors and he also started a wildlife sanctuary here.

The Mt. Kenya Wildlife Conservancy is located on the grounds of the hotel. Its mission is to save and rescue animals. Cheetahs and lions that were kept as pets, a 3 legged leopard that lost a paw in a snare, a blind lion cub, and many other orphaned animals are housed there.  They also strive to breed endangered species including the Bongo, a striped antelope. We were invited to feed water bucks, ostriches, llamas, baboon babies, and pet a juvenile cape buffalo, a tortoise, and a cheetah. https://mountkenyawildlifeconservancy.org/

To round off the day Greg lounged by the pool while I played golf on the grounds, crisscrossing the Equator from hole to hole though it did not seem to improve my game.  Simon was my caddy.  I should have listened to him.

We left the next day and just in time as the resort was busy for the weekend.  We drove back to Nairobi and then flew out to Frankfurt that night, our trip of a lifetime now just memories, photographs, and this blog.