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Published: March 9th 2019
After covering Masaimara in the last two video blogs, this is my third episode of the slideshow. This time my destination was Lake Nakuru and Lake Bogoria. Unlike Masaimara where we stayed in tents for two nights, we made day trips in both Lake Nakuru and Lake Bogoria. I made my base in Nakuru, so it was easy to cover them both in two separate day trips. But don’t underestimate the wild life of Lake Nakuru although the area is smaller as compared to Masaimara. True, it’s not a vast landscape like Mara, but there is no shortage of wild life in Lake Nakuru, - zebra, giraffe, impala, rhino, baboon, you name it. If you just want to experience wild life and a day of enjoying safari, a quick and easy way is to head out to Lake Nakuru.
Here it happened. I was beaten by a Rock Hyrax. It was partly my fault…the badger was getting too close to me during my sandwich hour. Such a cute little animal and I thought why can’t I cuddle it a bit. Wrong move and I took my African lesson with some blood on my arm! But that is not the end
of the story. Now here it goes! I wiped my blood with a tissue and bottle water, (I didn’t have any alcohol swab with me that I could use as antiseptic) and then I went on carrying on my business of African safari for the next week or so. Once I was back to Canada, my friend asked me if I received the Rabies vaccine shot. “Nope”, I told him. “You must immediately go see a doctor”, he was worried. So I went to a walk-in-clinic and told my story to the doctor.
“What is a Rock Hyrax,” the doctor asked me.
“Well, it’s a badger family; do I need to take a shot?” I asked him
“How long ago it happened,”?
“Well, I think it was three weeks ago.”
“Usually you get rabies from a dog bite, but badger? Ummm…Not sure, you better go to the hospital to check it out. We don’t keep rabies vaccine here.”
So I did…I went to the emergency of a downtown hospital and was admitted for checkup. The doctor came and asked me the same question, “What is a Rock Hyrax?” I was prepared this time. I
took out my phone and showed him the picture of the culprit that has bitten me. “Hmmm,” she said,” You know, over 90 percent rabies cases are due to dog bite, but badger? You better wait, let me find out.” Then she called the Chief Medical Officer of Calgary (didn’t know such a post do exists) and the Officer also didn’t know the answer. But the Officer called an expert meeting somewhere in the city while I was lying on the hospital bed having nightmares of Rabies. After one hour the verdict came, “you are safe”, the doctor came and told me. “Rock Hyrax can get rabies from hyenas, but after they get bitten they don’t live long and hyenas eat them anyway, so the culprit badger wouldn’t have been alive to bite you.” So, I am safe, I am safe! This is the second lesson I got…take all measures before romancing the wilderness. No matter what happened, I surely love this wild and beautiful continent! The video blog is to capture those amazing moments and wake up your desire to trample the same path that I continue to roam around in my dreamland Africa. Hope you would enjoy!
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Dancing Dave
David Hooper
My Africa Diary Part 3
A great way to preserve your memories, Tab. I guess you learnt the hard way that wild animals deserve the prefix "wild"...they can bite! Interesting selection of music including Grieg for the march of the flamingoes!