from Nairobi

This is a terrible keyboard with a barely functional space bar, but here is a quick summary of the safari including the top highlight of each day. I’ll post some photos in the near future, since I uncharacteristically took 300 rather than my usual 0 this time. This keyboard is too horrible to make editing worth the trouble, so my apologies in advance for any weird grammar or spelling; I’m writing on the fly before heading to the airport shortly.

Nov. 13, Masai Mara reserve, southern Kenya. Towards dusk, we return to a group of lionesses and cubs spotted earlier in the bushes. They emerge lackadaisically,walking right by our land cruiser. The cubs were yawning and sneezing, while the lionesses simply looked bored. The lead lioness walks at an even pace towards a group of gazelles on a nearby ridge. Like a brilliant military strategist, she walks to their left and then behind them, trying to turn their flank. At first it looks as though the gazelles will be tricked into running straight into the rest of the lions, but they wise up at the last minute and turn back up the ridge. The park closes at 6:30PM, so we had to leave without seeing the culmination of the hunt. But it was very dramatic to watch this family of lions wake up from sleep and go straight to work.

Nov. 14, still in Masai Mara. Our first full-day game drive. We advanced perhaps 30 miles into the park this day, stopping our progress at a river officially called the Mara River, but known to me forevermore as the Wildebeest River of Death: a true scene out of Dante’s hell. Nearby is a river ford where millions of wildebeest cross during their migration to the Serengeti. But there are too many of them, and though they are friendly animals, they are not very bright. As a result, they crush each other during the crossing and many drown. The corpses of the drowned wildebeest then wash down to the part of the river we crossed, where the bodies are stuck on large rocks. Vultures are there to pick the corpses clean. Every minute, two or three new dead wildebeests arrive with the current. It took all of us about ten seconds to realize the true nature of the scene, and when we all simultaneously grasped what was going on, we gasped and even cursed aloud.

Nov. 15, Lake Nakuru, northwest of Nairobi. Only night with a guesthouse rather than tents. Herd of zebras in front of the house. Two males in a fight, and the signature zebra fight move is amazing– they whirl around suddenly and swiftly and they back-kick into the face of their rival. But the real highlight of the day was a drive at dusk around the lake and encountering a number of white rhinos on the shore of the lake. It felt like a prehistoric scene, with perhaps a triceratops rather than a rhino.

Nov. 16, Ambuseli reserve, extreme southern Kenya at the foot of Mt. Kilimanjaro (which is just across the border in Tanzania). Briefly seeing the snowy peak of Kilimanjaro emerge from the rainclouds.

Nov. 17, Lake Mayanara, Tanzania. Thousands upon thousands of flamingoes in the lake.

Nov. 18, Ngorongoro Crater, Tanzania. An amazing site not far from Olduvai Gorge where Lucy and other protohuman remains were found. The animal highlight of the crater was as follows. A herd of wildebeest was blocking the road in front of us, motionless. In the distance, through binoculars, we see a lone hyena approaching them. The wildebeest begin to run straight toward us. The herd parts, and passes on both sides of us, running all the way. The hyena fails to catch any of them. Earlier in the day, we saw a similar failed hunt where a cheetah was trying to catch gazelles.

Nov. 19, Tarangire National Park,Tanzania. Without realizing it, we briefly become trapped in the middle of a herd of around 200 elephants. Luckily they have a good sense of smell and can tell individual humans apart, since the elephants in this park were angered two years ago when poachers entered and killed 6 baby elephants. All the local guides swear that in retaliation, 25 adult elephants traced the poachers to their village outside the park and laid waste to everything, including their cornfields.

It was also in Tarangire, last year, that a 10-year-old-boy foolishly ran off from the lodge by himself and was devoured by a leopard.

Our own closest brush with death was not too close, but close enough to be a bit scary: a hyena walked straight through our camp at dusk at the Ngorongoro Crater. A lion was also spotted there at dawn, though I was asleep at the time. The only violent incident ever to have occurred at this particular campsite was a warthog tearing into a tent that contained some food.

This won’t be my last post about the trip, which left a deep impression. My only regret is having waited this long to do it. I may go see the gorillas in Uganda and Rwanda next.