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Published: November 6th 2005
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narripi
Narripi at 4 weeks My travels in Kenya were a mix of beautiful places and broken bones.
The first week of my trip was spent at a conference called 'Mapping for Change' in Nairobi. There were 150 delegates from 50 countries as far apart as Fiji, Papua New Guinea, Canada, Malaysia, Botswana, India, Iran, Cameroon and many more. I made several new friends and look forward to working in this subject in a year's time.
I took the opportunity to visit the
David Sheldrick elephant orphanage over the road in Nairobi National Park and adopted a four week old baby elephant called Narripi. He had been found the week before by a Masai and he was lying in a waterhole and being attacked by hyenas. The Masaii walked 10 kilometres just to get help. At the time I saw Narripi, was just starting to feed and play again and the staff were being optimistic about his chances. Sadly he died a few weeks later but the sponsorship is being used for another elephant, Kora.
A colleague from Leicester Uni had kindly arranged for some Kenyan colleagues, Reuben and James, to meet me and take me to Lakes Bagoria and Baringo where I met up with
buffalo
Water buffalo William Kimosop who had studied at Leicester last year.
Lake Bagoria is a soda lake and home to thousands of flamingos at certain times. To make it more atmospheric there are hot springs and geysers steaming away along the shoreline. Kimosop welcomed me to his bungalow on the edge of the lake. He is Senior game warden for the Baringo area and has many plans to sympathetically develop tourism in the region.
Kimosop also has a dream to take local children bush camping so that they can learn about and appreciate the wildlife in the region. Many people in Kenya never actually see all the wonderful wildlife in the reserves. I promised to ask friends if they have any old tents, sleeping bags etc would they be willing to donate them for this project. So .. if you have anything that you think would be useful please let me know, save it, and I will arrange for it to be sent out when I get home.
One morning I set off with Kimosop and his driver as he was going over to the other side of the rift valley for a meeting. After 100 yards there were
flamingo
Flamingos at Lake Bagoria no longer 3 of us but 10 people squashed into the car for the journey. I sat listening to the Swahili jokes and laughter and wished I could understand the good humour.
The Rift Valley is fantastic and crossing from one side to the other I realised that it is not a single valley but a whole series of parallel faults that create a series of valleys and steep 6000ft escarpments. Each slope seemed to differ in both vegetation and wealth or poverty of the people that lived there.
On the way back we saw large storms crossing the valleys and were caughtin a terrential thundery downpour. At one point the rain was lashing down vertically, the driver could hardly see the road and an enormous lightening flash hit the ground beside us. I think all 10 of us in the car screamed! This was supposed to be the small rainy season in Kenya but they were getting far more heavy storms and flooding than usual.
The next day James and Reuben drove me to Lake Baringo, a fresh water lake further north. I took a boat trip out to one of the islands and met the
hotspring
Hot springs, Lake Bagoria local villagers. On the way I saw hippos for the first time and we fed one of the local fish eagles.
While I was at lake Baringo I went to visit a local organisation that is trying to help local people improve their agricultural practices. By planting grass and fencing off the areas they are able to both increase productivity and prevent erosion. Much of the land is devoid of grass and therefore it is difficult to feed goats and provide food. In the areas that have been reseeded the grass grows quickly and can be used for thatching, to sell seed and also to fatten cattle.
One evening Elizabeth picked me up as she was heading out to see the impact of flooding in the area due to the unseasonal rainfall. Her son drove through muddy river crossings as we viewed the impact of the flood. We had little time as the evening was drawing in and more rain was approaching that would swell the river and cut us off. At several points we got out of the 4WD to look closer and racing across a muddy field I slipped into a ditch falling on my left
hippo
Hippo, Lake Baringo hand. When I looked at it as I sat in the mud it had a very strange shape! Elizabeth managed to straighten it but I knew it was either dislocated or broken. It was too late to get to Nakuru that evening as the river had made the road out impassable. The next morning James drove me to Nakuru hospital and the x-ray confirmed the break. I should then have gone straight to the larger modern hospital in Nairobi but thougt a simple cast would be OK at Nakuru. However the doctor in the process managed to push the bone out of place.
I went on next day to Nakuru and James and Reuben took me on a safari around this beautiful reserve. The highlights were my first views of rhino and lion. The huge flocks of pink flamingo marching along the lake edge are an incredible sight.
The next day I got to Nairobi and went straight to Nairobi Hospital. There after another x-ray the orthopedic surgeon pronounced that I needed a pin in my wrist to hold it in place. An operation under general anaesthetic was not what I had planned for the evening before I
balloon
Hot air balloon over the Masai Mara was to join a seven week trip camping through Africa. Feeling very scared and with a lot of tears, I agreed to have the op that evening and join the tour the next day at Naivasha. The hospital staff were excellent and I woke up after the operation wanting to be on my way.
I joined the group the next day at a campsite near Naivasha. Most of my new travelling companions were from Australia or New Zealand and suddenly I found that not only did I need to learn new African languages but Aussie too! I was made welcome and made it clear that although I only had one arm I wanted to do my share on the trip if possible. I found camping with only one arm functioning not so bad when I realised which tasks were OK, which hard and which impossible. Stuffing a sleeping bag into it's sack was one of the impossible tasks!
Our first stop was a trip to the Masai Mara. We had two nights at one of the campsites in the reserve with morning and evening game drives and an optional hot air balloon trip. I would recommend the Masai Mara to everyone who goes to Kenya. We were there at the right time as the wildebeast were at the northern end of their annual migration across the Serengeti so the plains were packed with bucking, cavorting beasts. I took the option of the hot air balloon which was fantastic. From that perspective I really got a sense of the number of animals on the plains and could start to see them forming moving streams heading back south towards the Mara river. The balloon trip ended with a scrumptious champagne breakfast on the plains where we landed - just far enough from the river not to be disturbed by the hippos.
After the Masai Mara we headed back to Nairobi to pick up our proper overland truck, Mutley, for the next part of the journey south into Tanzania.
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