This was a very long day. Got up at 4 am, transferred reduced gear to 9-person Land Rovers, drove to the Crater rim in a fog. As we climbed, it was getting colder and colder. Maasai people with their cattle were everywhere. When we stopped for a photo, a Maasai warrior came up to the vehicle wanting to sell his spear. We got the impression that he had done this before. Richard shook hands with him and his hands were very cold. They stool keep to their traditions of wearing the colorful. Blankets, and living off their cattle, drinking cow blood and milk. We went down to the inside of the crater and within half an hour, we saw a soad lake with hundreds of flamingos. Not too much later, we saw a cheetah stalking a ... read more

This will be somewhat fractured because we are posting in a hurry: Geckos was waiting fro us at the hotel and we left Nairobi with twenty tourists, a guide(Malinga), driver (hungery man) and cook(Peter). First stop, a save on size grocery store for bottled water and nibbles. Then we hit the highway south for Tanzina. Suburban Nairobi is a endless series of homes in poverty  condition, dirt roads with ruts, cars with hood up, and garbage everywhere. Men sitting around vacantly where Richard would have been busy cleaning up. Eventually we left Nairobi behind and entered vert dry savanna with colorful Maasai herdsmen tending sheep, goats and cattle. Isolated fields suddenly produced a family walking on a dirt trail, or a ten year old boy minding a hundred goats. These boys waved as we passed and ... read more

We arrived at Heathrow after an uneventful flight, greeted by Leanne & Brad who came to pick us up. Personal service door to door. How nice! We knew that this weekend would be the only days that they didn't have to work, so we took advantage of the time and good weather to go for a walk and do a maternity photo shoot of the twins-expecting couple in Regents Park. We were very pleased with the result - some of the best ones are on Kayla's Facebook page. Leanne's baby bump is getting quite big already, and getting bigger by the day, with three more months yet to go. We settled quite nicely into a daily routine for the rest of the week. On Monday, we celebrated Richard's birthday by attending a BBC Proms concert at ... read more

Hampstead Heath & Wedding Party Today, Saturday we let Leanne and Brad be our guides to North London. So we walked from home to Hampstead Heath (40 minutes) in a slight drizzle. Lunch from the local Saturday morning stands at the Heath was yummie Sausage Burgers and Coke. We got a good view of London to the south from Parliament Hill and tried to spy Greenwich with Brad's binoculars and iPhone ( for directions). Leanne went off for a hair appointment and Brad lead through the network of park trails, trees all in fall colours. That evening we participated in the Leanne and Brad wedding celebration - London version. We taxied with the happy couple, dressed in wedding day White Dress and Suit to Shepherd's Bush and spend the night visiting with their many and some ... read more

Rocks, Dinosaurs and Albert Today Richard took Kayla to the Natural History Museum in Kensington so she could see the rock room for herself. She patiently wandered through the 300 cases of rock samples without a single yawn. Richard could have stayed there all day but there were still dinosaurs to see. Then a short walk over to Hyde Park, a picture of the Albert Memorial, glorious fall colours along the Serpentine and across Green Park to Marble Arch. We reached Camden Town tube stop in time to buy supper fixings at the very international and busy Sainsbury’s. Then home for supper and Africa and wedding picture viewing with Leanne and Brad. ... read more