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Published: June 13th 2017
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Monkey see, monkey do
Mount Kenya Wildlife Conservancy Animal Orphanage Geo: 0.01945, 37.0744
DAY TWELVE (Tuesday, September 15, 2009)
I bless the rains down in Africa
It rained here today …the first time in more than two years. There was much celebration. It reminded me of the Toto song "Africa" … check out this acapella version:
http://www.videosift.com/video/Africa-Acapella-cover
We had a late breakfast today and then headed to the Wildlife Conservancy Animal Orphanage mid-morning with Anne, Barcy, Stephanie and Carol, along with Ralph & Nancy Patterson, Sandy Mascorro and Karen Berry (all of Los Angeles county). The orphanage is on the grounds of the hotel and is funded through private donations. Stephanie Powers is an active supporter; William Holden was a founder.
“The Elephant Man” was our tour guide … he is known as that because he survived being attacked by an elephant in the wild, gutted three times by his tusks, held his guts in and got away and hid himself in a hole, all the while talking to compadres who came to find him. But before they got there, seven other elephants encircled him and covered him with dust to hide and protect him. It took him seven months to recover.
He introduced us to:
- African lynx
· Bongo … an endangered species
· Series of primates, including a Annie feeds ostrich
Mount Kenya Wildlife Conservancy Animal Orphanage Sykes monkey that sat on Patrick's head
· Llama and ostrich, both of which had an attachment for the big guy; Anne and Barcy both hand-fed the female ostrich
· Giant tortoise that gave us rides
· Patrick also fed an élan and a Colobus monkey
· We met some pygmy hippos and a zebroid, a cross between a horse and a zebra, which looks like a horse with tiger stripes
The ultimate goal of the Conservancy is to send healthy, recovered animals back into the wild.
After lunch, a group of six of us went off to play golf. The Mt. Kenya Golf Club is a 9-hole executive course designed by Jack Nicklaus and is located right on property. Pat Cashin, Ralph Patterson and Stephanie Foote played in the first group. Patrick and I played with Dave Jones.
Just as we were ready to tee off, the first hard rain to hit Nanyuki in three years (no kidding!) arrived. We waited 20 minutes for the rain to slow to a drizzle and off we went.
A summary of the afternoon:
· Bad weather
· Bad course
· Bad golf
Nonetheless, we all laughed a lot and had a great time. A few things noteworthy:
· Although Jack designed it, no one
Zebroid - zebra/horse hybride
Mount Kenya Wildlife Conservancy Animal Orphanage has maintained it. The greens were some of the worst we have ever played and the fairways are no better.
· We decided to play because it was there … and we can say we played in Africa.
· There are two especially interesting holes:
The 4th hole has the only water hazard on the course (although there are some marsh carries) and it is shaped like the continent of Africa. The stepping stone path through the hazard represents the equator.
The 7th whole is actually a straight shot along the equator, so you can play in either hemisphere, depending on whether you pull or slice.None of us had a score we were proud of but that didn't matter, mainly because there were no scorecards and no one kept score, except perhaps in their heads. We had six caddies and six sets of rental clubs. We exhausted the supply. The next group who wanted to play had to wait for us to come in with the clubs and the caddies.
The per-person cost for the round? $55 per person, including 9 holes of golf, club rental (you should have seen the clubs), three
used golf balls and caddie tip. An investment well worth the experience.
Between I bless the rains down in Africa
With apologies to ToTo
Kenyans hadn't seen rain in 2+ years golf and dinner I burned a CD of 300 slides that represent the trip, for each pair to take home. Time consuming but fun. I plan to have a looping slide show at dinner tomorrow night.
Dinner was yummy again. Things cooled down dramatically with the rain, so we all had our raincoats, pashminas and jackets out for the evening.
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