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| Thousands of Flamingoes at Lake Oloiden near Naivasha |
Lake Naivasha is about an hour and a half away by car from Nairobi. Thinking that a quick day trip was do-able, we headed out with Dianna on her way to work dropping us off at a matatu (mini-bus) stop bound for the region. Or so we thought! As we discovered, there was no matatu - at least not going from that location! After being advised by various reliable sources, but against our gut feeling, we caught a matatu in to Nairobi proper. At the terminus, our bus conductor who had promised to direct us towards our next leg, promptly forgot and started wandering off. Catching him just in time, he directed us part-way towards an express matatu: a 20 minute walk through Nairobi's unsavoury River St. district. Not long to wait though and finally we really were Naivasha-bound. We managed to walk through Nairobi unscathed - nice!!
The main road coming down into Naivasha town was super-scenic with views over Africa's 8 million year old Great Rift Valley - the one and the same rift valley that we'd been in and out of in Tanzania, Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda, and Malawi. The valley stretched as far as the eye could see (of course) and was beautiful with grassy plains, ochre soil and jagged peaks of the volcanic craters of Hell's Gate and Mt. Longonot National Parks. Just one more matatu to catch amongst the madness of Naivasha town, and we arrived at Camp Carnelly's situated at the lake's edge - approximately 6 hours after leaving the house that morning! All was good though: we had arrived gratefully safe. A good job that we had come prepared for an overnight stay though!
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| Ethan and Martin with a curious little trunk |
The shores of fresh water lake Naivasha fringed with papyrus and yellow barked acacias play host to many protected species including hippo, fish eagles, many aquatic birds, and antelope. Unfortunately, for the Masai tribe it also attracted many early colonial settlers. Historically the area was big on beef cattle, and fruit and veg production irrigated by the waters of the lake. Today, the $400 million-a-year flower industry is blooming and booming. Flowers picked here early morning are in Europe's auctions the same day! The downside of this success, of course, is the impact on the local environment - threatening the very survival of the source of the industry's creation - the lake. Pesticides and fertilizers seep into the lake reeking havoc on its ecosystem. Drawing water for irrigation also means the lake is receding too, to only 170 sq km. How well the 1995 conservation effort to protect the lake and it's wildlife is not clear.
What we do know is that Lake Oloiden, a small crater lake snug up against Naivasha's southwest shore, is now home to Lesser Flamingos. Pretty cool, yes, but concerning, as it is probably an indication that its freshwater habitat is changing providing the right environment for the flamingos food source - Spirulina, a blue-green algae that grow only in very alkaline lakes. The algae's photosynthetic pigments give the birds their pink colour.
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| The baby elephants leaving the feeding zone |
Riding both on the back of a single moto-taxi, we arrived at Oloiden lake. We didn't even need to take an expensive boat ride out to see the flamingos - they were right there wading in the shallows. It was like watching National Geographic channel but waaaaay better: triggering our senses with the stunning sea of pale pink rimming the edge, hearing loud squawking chatter, and, boy, not to mention the stench! Their plumage is pinkish white, some more pink than others and with wing coverts flecked with red. Compared to Greater Flamingos, they are smaller, more pink have more black on their filtering bills. They also eat shrimp. I found out that these birds live to 60 - 70 years old in captivity.
We were held mesmerized by the flamingos for at least a couple of hours until the rains came down. An Australian / Kenyan couple rescued us from the downpour in their car dropping us off further down the road where we enjoyed good food at our neighbouring camp. Just before dark we headed to our own camp, and hung out all evening in the pretty cool bar/hang out areas. It was a pretty chilly evening chilling at Carnelly's, but we enjoyed the unique funky construction and chill-out areas choc-full with monster-sized comfy cushions. At bed time three hippo were lined up by the barb fence at the water's edge serenely chewing away.
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| Getting some giraffe love from a Rothschild Giraffe |
Up before the sunrise, we had to be back in Nairobi by 10am to meet Dianna, Derek and the kids. On our way out, sitting in the bar were two white local Kenyans having coffee before heading out, themselves back to Nairobi. A quick hello and chat and we'd got ourselves a ride. Nice! What a blessing not to have to do those matatus at this time of day! And we had a sweet ride in the back of Grant's monster flatbed army truck! It was if anything, an unconventional ride, and a mode of transport we had not yet taken! We loved every minute sitting in our folding canvas chairs with sweeping views back at Mt. Longonot and the rift valley as we headed back up the escarpment and into Nairobi's suburbs. That was, until the final corner, where Grant took it with a little too much speed and we went flying sideways, smashing one of the chairs!
We met Dianna and Derek in the suburb of Karen (named after Karen Blixen famous for being the author of "Out of Africa"). Being a Saturday we were looking forward to spending some time with them and our first stop was the David Sheldrick Elephant Orphanage where babies abandoned by
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| Too much tongue for Derek in this encounter |
dead or poached parents are rescued. They feed off baby formula milk and twice day it's very cute to watch them entwine their trunks around the big plastic bottles. They also enjoyed playing in the mud, slipping and sliding and pushing each other around. We learned that elephants can live between 50 and 70 years old. A lengthy process, these ones will be re-habituated back into the wild, and then if the elephant is happy and is accepted into its new herd it will make decide to stay. It was really cool watching the kids interact with the baby elephants, and we thoroughly enjoyed their little trunks curiously reaching out to us, inviting us to stroke them!
The Langata Giraffe Centre is a refuge for endangered Rothschild's giraffes and the main attraction here is that you can feed them. You get a real up close and personal look at the size of their heads, their beautiful eyes, and the interesting furry horns on top of their heads. If you're like Martin and Derek, you can get some love too - they'll kiss you for their nubbins of grub. The Rothschild's are a pretty giraffe with an ivy-leaf coat pattern, quite different from other giraffe we had seen throughout Africa (there are about 7 species of giraffe). What made us laugh is their huge grey tongues and the boys certainly got some very sloppy kisses with far too much tongue! Eeeeww! * Mush
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