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Published: November 30th -0001
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After the morning game drive we headed towards Lake Nakuru, stopping off at a Masai Village. This was the tourist stop.
The Masai welcomed us into the village by doing the jumping in the air dance with lots of grunting and whooping, then proceeded to show us around the village.
Inside the outer fence there is another fenced compound where they keep their cattle and goats to stop them being eaten/stolen. In the middle of this is one of the trees that the Masai and the locals use to keep away mozzies and as a treatment for Malaria by boiling the leaves and drinking the the tea.
They also use the twigs from the tree to clean their teeth, (this wasn't just something they told the tourists, we saw loads of people doing it) by whittling the bark from one end, splitting the fibres and brushing away. Kind of like brushing your teeth with a furry chilli stick. nice.
We got shown around one of the Masai houses, built by weaving horizontal branches between vertical posts, then filling the gaps with goat turd. Very small (they're not very big these Masai chaps), and warm, with a separate
room for the goats probably for when its a bit nippy out.
Then the hard sell began! In the middle of the village there was... stuff for sale Yay! We didn't mind too much, I bought a (used) Masai blanket, and Marianne a couple of bracelets. You can't blame them really, they've been dispossessed of land and moved from pillar to post for about the last 100 years, so making a bit of cash out of the rich tourists that come past is only sensible.
It was here we left behind Borut and Mateja who were staying a night in the village, never to be seen again... and headed to Lake Nakuru via an, if possible, more dusty road than the one to the Masai Mara. (We expected to see them back in Nairobi backpackers a few days later but either the Masai ate something more subsatantial than goats blood and milk, or they'd moved on).
On the way to Nakuru we passed up the opportunity to spend about a million KSh on a boat ride and went straight to our hotel. It was clean and comfortable, but with running water only between the minutes of 22:30
and 22:33. There were a few conferences on while we were there, one seemed to be the "Women of Nakuru that liked spontaneously bursting into song at random" conference. While we were eating dinner about a 100 of them came in to have their dinner and when finished broke into song. It was quite impressive, with harmony's and all sorts. They really weren't expecting the round of applause we gave them when they finished.
They didn't serve beer in the hotel so we went across the road to the "local" pub. After the deafening silence and the last of the tumbleweeds had blown out of the door Joyce the barmaid/man gave us all a Tusker (The Kenyan Lager) and we sat back to listen to the wondrously monotonous Congolese music DVD they put on the TV. If you've never witnessed the musical wonder for yourself it's difficult to describe, combine a bad working mens club keyboardist playing in the same bad plinky plonky riff over and over again to a bongo beat with no breaks or pauses or choruses or discernable difference between one song to the next. Throw in some men and women furiously wiggling their bottoms all
over the place wearing feathers and skins, you know traditional dress, and you've kind of got it.
I nearly got into a bit of trouble on that one, by this time we had been accosted by a half cut 'Carpenter' who kept trying to explain what a carpenter was. He was also determined to express on us the greatness of the Congolese music that was plinking on in the background, (and also demonstrate his dancing prowess, he danced like my dad. Sort of Left foot forward, left foot back, right foot forward, right foot back, whilst rolling the shoulders up near his ears. Awesome).
I had noticed that the song had 'changed'. It wasn't that audibly obvious, I saw the subtitles come up so I asked him which was his favourite, nodding at the screen. At this point there was a half naked man clad in feathers on display and his face changed suddenly, I think he thought I was asking him which male dancer he preferred..Ahem. A quick change of subject back to Carpentry and how nice my 'wife' was seemed to appease his wrath. (He boogied back over to the bar and carried on drinking)
Masai Warrior
Here we have John the Masai sporting this seasons look. Nakuru town itself is right next to the Lake where the park is so getting there in the morning took about 5 mins. Lake Nakuru is absolutely beautiful, fringed with Flamigoes and with Zebra and Water Buffalo wandering about, it is one of the places where White Rhino can be seen quite easily. There are also Black Rhino and Leopards but they are harder to spot (we only saw the White Rhino from a distance). The park also contains Warthogs, Rothchilds Giraffes, and lots of Baboons, amongst others.
The vista from 'Baboon Cliffs' is spectacular, providing a breathtaking view of the lake and surrounding grassland and forest. You also get a chance to see the Hyrax (Slightly ugly looking things that look like giant Guinea Pigs) sunbathing on the rocks near the edge and some strikingly coloured red and blue lizards clambering about. We even caught sight of some Dik-Dik in the forest on the way down which are apparently quite hard to see.
All eyes were scanning the trees for Leopards as we left the park but unfortunately it remains the other elusive unchecked box alongside the Black Rhino on our 'Big five' list.
In case
you don't know, (we didn't) the phrase 'Big Five Game' was coined by big-game hunters and refers to the five large mammals that were sought in Africa.
The quintet consists of the Lion, the African elephant, the African buffalo, the Leopard and the Black Rhinoceros. The members of the big five were chosen for the difficulty in hunting them and not their size, which is why the Leopard is on the list and the Hippo is not.
The African buffalo or Cape Buffalo (Syncerus caffer) is apparently the most dangerous of the Big Five, reportedly causing the most hunter deaths. So there you go.
Back to Nairobi again, Yay. Claire and Julien are also heading to Lamu so we are off to the bus station to get booked onto a bus to Mombasa. More soon.
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