Full Throttle

We left Lake Nakuru to spend time at Lake Naivasha, which is very well known for flamingos and pelicans.  There were thousands of pelicans as far as the eye could see. 

A few pelicans were there that day.

And One Hundred and One Pink Flamingos.

Emily, who was traveling in our tour group, was brave enough to run towards the birds for an amazing photo opp.  It was funny to watch as she approached thousands of birds in flip-flops and bare feet...ewwww...

The lake is quite shallow and filled with lily pads and beautiful floating papyrus plants in bloom.

Lake Naivasha.

Papyrus in bloom.

We signed a waiver and hopped into a little boat for an up close look at the lake and its inhabitants.  We watched a fish eagle skillfully snatch a carp out of the lake.

Greg and Zanner on the boat.  Lifejackets - safety first!

Our boat for the Lake Naivasha adventure.

Then the star attraction appeared.  Our little boat was surrounded by hippos less than 10 meters away.  I remember reading that hippos are the most aggressive and vicious safari animal.  I reminded myself to stay calm.  Our boat driver, David, did not seem to think it was an issue. 

Can you spot the hippos?

Oh, a hippo spotted me!

The hippos were eating and hanging out in large groups, mostly submerged under the water.  The hippos can touch the bottom of the lake, but all we saw were ears and eyes.  They like to spit out water and snort, especially when we got close.  It was an up close and personal experience.

All of a sudden, I look at the still waters and wonder why there is a wake in the middle of a calm lake?  Next thing I know, a hippo thinks our boat is too close to his family and is charging after us!  Holy crap!  The driver grabs the engine and guns it...FULL THROTTLE!  We had to get out of there as fast as possible.  My heart was in my throat and I was hanging on with both hands.  David grabbed his big wooden stick - seriously?  Like that would save us from the jaws of an angry hippo!  I asked him:  "David, do you have a gun?" to which he replied:  "No, I have a stick".  Seriously??   My heart was still pounding 2 hours later.

At Lake Naivasha Lodge our room was on the second floor of a cottage with a balcony, leather chairs, king size bed and a gorgeous blue tiled bathroom larger than my entire bedroom at home. 

Cottages at Lake Naivasha Lodge.

Our suite with a view.

Pretty swanky!

On the lawn outside our cottage were zebras, monkeys, antelope and giraffe.  They were all hanging out having a garden party.

Welcome to my garden party.

At night when it was dark, we had to dial zero on our phone to summon a guard (with a stick) to walk us to the main lodge and dining hall so that we would not get eaten by a hippo.  All I could think was "I sure hope he has a BIG stick!".

That night, just before bed, Greg and I stepped out onto our balcony.  There was a hippo eating grass right below our balcony, lit up by the floodlight on the roof.  It was pretty crazy, and hopefully a once in a lifetime event where we said: "Oh honey look, there's a hippo outside our door".

Dazzle

Our tour guide, Jacob, is very knowledgeable, especially on topics of animal torture and killing, animal sex and poop.  He told us a story:  You do NOT want to be a male animal in Africa: 

   1)  Male zebras determine dominance by biting and ripping off the testicles of other zebras.

   2)  Male elephants have to wait until they are 40 before they mate.

   3)  Male rhinos fight to the death.

The African safari awakens all your senses.  All the things you learned in school (and from watching The Lion King) regarding nature, animals, biology, symbiosis and the circle of life come alive in a vivid display right before your eyes.

The morning fog was so thick that you could see the floating water droplets.  Today's new find was the ostrich, giraffe and hyena.

Male ostrich at dawn.

Check out that drumstick!

Gentle giraffe at dawn.

The rare two-headed giraffe.

Hyenas look cute, but they are vicious.  Hyenas will stalk their prey and then take a bite out of the animal.  The animal will run away.  The hyena eventually catches up and takes another bite.  The prey dies trying to run away while being eaten alive.  Mother Nature must have had PMS when she inspired the hyena

Cute like a teddy bear!

...or not.

A large herd of impala drew near.  It was evident that there was one male and approximately 30 females.  Jacob pointed out how exhausted the lone male impala must be.  First he had to fight off all the other male impalas for dominance over the females; then he had to keep all those women in line; then he had to mate with them all!  I was tired just learning about impalas.

The male Impala and his 30 wives.

Impala.

We saw white monkeys with blue balls.  Yup, their "boys" are bright turquoise blue which is an odd color to see in nature.  I guess the male monkeys cannot use the famous "blue balls" excuse with their wives!

Blue ball monkey - his good side.

I found the safari educational, especially when it comes to digestion and defecation.  Everyone's favorite subjects, right!?!  The giraffe has very efficient digestion; it eats ~50 kg of plants in 24 hours and it poops small pellets. 

An elephant, on the other hand, must eat ~300 kg in 24 hours.  It is not as efficient with digestion and as a result it has big, clumpy, wet poop.

A perplexing potential pachyderm poop predicament.

Hyena poop when it dries it turns white due to the high calcium content from eating all those bones.

That is enough about death, sex and crap for one blog entry.  Did you know that a group of zebras is called a dazzle? 

A dazzle of a traffic jam.

The Voice of an Angel at the Equator

An early morning allowed us to leave The Ark and head to Lake Nakuru National Park.  We started Day Two of our safari with a game drive.  It did not disappoint!

Warthog.

Cape Buffalo.

Silver backed Jackal.

White Rhino.

Zebra.

Baboon.

Rare North American brown haired Greg.

Our overland truck has roof hatches and steps that allow us to stand, look out and take photos. 

Jacob and Greg in the roof hatch.

Our drive took us across the equator and through part of the Great Rift Valley, which extends from Syria to Mozambique. 

As Jacob pronounced it:  The Great Riftee Valley

Greg and Zanner standing on the Equator.
Every time a sailor crosses the Equator, he gets a new tattoo.
Thank goodness we were driving.

During my travels, people always ask if the water rotates the other way in the Southern hemisphere.  Well, in fact, it does.  At our stop at the equator, a man showed us a neat experiment.  He had a bucket and a match stick.  The bucket had a hole in the bottom.  The experiment was such that as he drained the water from the bucket, the matchstick that was floating on top of the water would rotate. 

Highly technical scientific experiment equipment.

We stood north of the equator, and the match stick turned clockwise.  A few steps took us to the southern hemisphere and the match stick turned counter-clockwise.  I am sure you are dying to know what happened when we stood directly on the equator.  The matchstick did not rotate.  I love science!  This was almost too much excitement for one day.
 

The Kenyans took very good care of us.  There were many extra security precautions due to the tensions between Kenya and the Somali Al-Shabaab terrorist group.  Anytime we entered a hotel, park or a crowded area, security was present and they would scan us, our vehicle and contents.  A few weeks prior to my arrival in Kenya, Al-Shabaab bombed a nightclub and a coffee shop in Nairobi.  This fact was always on the back of my mind during the safari, but once we left the big cities I was confident we were safe.

After a day of game drives, we had dinner at the Lake Nakuru lodge.  We were entertained by a Kenyan choir whose singers created beautiful harmonies to well known songs like "Michael Row Your Boat".  It was beautifully rhythmic. 

Not too shabby!

Our room at Lake Nakuru Lodge.

View from our room of the Nakuru plains.

Towards the end of the choir performance, each singer explained how their voice was inspired by one of the animals from the land (pelican, rhino, gazelle, buffalo etc.).  They selected me out of the crowd to join them in a song and dance.  This was followed up by the lead singer saying my voice was inspired by an angel.  Ha - the Angel of Off-Key maybe!  Their charm worked well and resulted in delusions of my singing prowess, and Greg buying their CD.  A little flattery can go straight to the bank.

Jambo!

Jambo! Jambo! This means welcome in Swahili.  Welcome to Kenya.  Day one of my safari I flew from Addis Ababa, Ethiopia to Nairobi Kenya to meet up with Greg E. Poo.

A driver picked me up at the airport, and as we made our way out of the arrivals lane the driver confirmed I was here on safari.  He said that Kenya has the best safaris:  "In fact, there is a giraffe in the field over there".  Seriously?  As I gaze into the field across the highway leaving the airport, sure enough there is a giraffe.  FIRST DAY!  That's pretty cool even though it looked like a tall brown speck and was at least 3 kilometers away.

I met up with Greg at the Hotel Panafric, and I was blown away by how much I missed him and by the luxury of a modern hotel.  After the power outages and cold showers of Ethiopia I found the safari hotels and lodges a bit overwhelming. 

Greg and I travelled with a fabulous group of people through Intrepid Travel, and our leader was a local Kenyan named Jacob.  Jacob told us up front that our chance of seeing animals on the safari was 3%.  Seriously?  Jacob has a thick Swahili accent, and maybe he means 3% chance of NOT seeing an animal?  We paid a lot of money for only 3% otherwise.  Hmmm...I was a bit concerned.  

We hopped into our overland truck which is a modified semi or cube van.  They installed large windows and bucket seats, an overhead look-out and voila - a safari vehicle.  The windows had a seam right in the line of sight, and it was a bit crowded and uncomfy but the excitement of being on a safari won us over.

Jacob and Zanner in the Intrepid overland truck.

Our first stop was the Aberdare National Park (near Mount Kenya).  We stayed at "The Ark Forest Lodge", a remote hotel villa modeled like  Noah's ship.  We were greeted by an incredibly beautiful peacock; not bad for day one.  Access to the Ark was via a high suspension foot bridge/catwalk.  This helps keep the people away from the animals, which I appreciated.

"Jambo!  Welcome to Kenya!"

The catwalk to The Ark.  Yes, we walked in two-by-two.



You don't have to tell me twice!



Inside our room on The Ark.

In the Ark there were multiple levels, a dining room, a bar, and several viewing decks.  The best part was a stone bunker built at ground level, accessible only from inside the Ark.  The stone bunker has no lighting and there are no chairs in the bunker as it is standing room only.   The stone walls have rectangular openings at eye level. This allowed us to be less than 10 meters away from the watering hole adjacent to the facility.  After sunset, we hid out in the bunker and watched the lit-up watering hole.   I was tired and watching a bunch of mud wasn't very exciting. 

Watering hole at sunset.

Just when my patience was wearing thin, along came eight elephants.  The elephants were so close I could smell them!  I watched them eat, pee and poo.  The elephant family consisted of babies, teenagers, adults and seniors. 

My first African elephant!

The rocks in between the bunker and the elephants prevented me from getting tickled by a trunk.

One elephant had tusks so long that  they curled up and crossed one another.  This created a built in trunk holder for the old elephant.  Cape buffalo also joined the elephants, and one elephant trumpeted to get the buffalo to move away.  That was pretty awesome for our FIRST DAY!  Take THAT, Jacob, and your 3%!  

 

Last Day in Ethiopia

On the last day of my Ethiopian adventure, the team had the morning off.  This gave me a chance to see some of the sights I really wanted to experience before leaving.

We toured Mount Entoto which is within Addis Ababa city limits.  It had fantastic views.

Zanner, Nicole, Steven and the view at Mt. Entoto.

Mt. Entoto jump by Steve.

We saw streams of women hauling huge bundles of firewood up the mountain.  I have tremendous respect for the amount of physical labour the Ethiopian women carry out every day. 

This load of firewood was hauled for likely over 3 kms.

Hauling a large bundle, wrapped up and on her back.

Just for fun we thought we should check out the Canadian Embassy.  Would you believe it was closed?  We showed our passports and asked the security guard if we could enter the gate for a photo.  Nope, not allowed.  We asked if we could look in the open gate but remain outside.  Nope, that also is not allowed.  We asked what would happen if we needed help from our embassy today (lost passport, or political unrest of some kind).  The guard told us to come back tomorrow.  That did not seem very Canadian to me!

The afternoon was spent with the children at Alemgena who put together a very professional presentation that absolutely blew me away.  The show included a dramatic skit that made me cry (it was about the death of a mother and her two young boys forced onto the streets). 

Three students performing in the skit.

To lighten the mood the skit was followed up with dancing and singing.  The kids all helped bake a really big, round loaf of bread of which Dr. Northcott cut the first slice.  Everyone in attendance (kids, guardians, volunteers and teachers) shared a slice of bread with a cup of coffee.

Dance demonstration - so sweet!

Older children performing traditional Ethiopian dances.

Some of the older children made speeches to thank the Canadians for their assistance with the YTH Alemgena program.  It was very touching, moving and emotional.  One of the speeches was captured on video and can be viewed  here:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lCDYrX_vP6c

Our M.C.s.

As it was our last night in Addis the BEKA project manager, Abiy, invited the team to his home for a farewell dinner.  Abiy and his wife Jeri are very generous hosts. 

Jeri and Abiy.

The spread put on by Jeri and her family was like none I had ever seen.  They had been cooking all day!  She served ten to fifteen different dishes including roast beef, fish, chicken, pizza, Spanish omelet, rice and spinach, battered carrots, zucchini, salad, potato salad, beans with carrots, meatballs, bread and my favorite - beef tibs.

Amazing spread of food for our farewell dinner.

A beautiful presentation.

After dinner, Abiy and his BEKA partner, Alex, presented us with a certificate of thanks for our volunteer work.  I was very touched by their generosity and kindness.  Our farewell dinner was the perfect way to celebrate the amazing group I traveled with, and a life changing 2 weeks!