Mama Elaine here… Wow wow wow, what a start to the day, just when we thought yesterday could not be surpassed - it was!! I was alone at breakfast when I sighted a leopard who are not frequent visitor to this area, I was SOOO excited, by the time the others appeared bleary eyed from their slumber he had gone back into the bush. Fortune was on our side, as on leaving The Ark there he was the most beautiful sight a female leopard not more the 3 metres from us. Sh...

Bwana Laurel here... At 8.30am, Joshua, our driver and guide picked us up and drove through Nairobi to the Aberdare Country Club and The Ark Hotel (& yes we did enter 'two by two!). It's sooo beautiful up here and lush! The country club has a 9 hole golf course - which, after seeing numerous wart hogs on it, Kevin called a "nine hog" golf course!! Classic!! We were all discussing how we would love to buy the place as it has such a relaxed and wonderful feel....

Hujambo (hullo) from Nic... Picked up by Joshua, what a great driver with a great sense of humour and very knowledgeable. This leisurely day started at the David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust for Orphaned Elephants where we were to meet our sponsored elephants, Surgut and Sities, however a little problem, they have recently been graduated and relocated to Tsavo East NP. The elephants we saw were absolutely beautiful. The David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust for Orphaned El...

Our flight with SAA from Jo'burg to Nairobi was over the plains of Africa, very dry and barren with a view of Mt Kilimanjaro, partially covered in cloud and near the Tanzanian border. The Nairobi arrival terminal is the former multi level car park with major work being undertaken on a new terminal. We were met by Benson from our local safari tour company for the 15k drive to the Stanley Sarova Hotel in Nairobi by Joshua who will be our driver to the Kenyan border...

Wow what a start to the holiday after leaving Melbourne at 6.45am and heading for Johannesburg from Sydney at 9.50am we flew south and at around 4.30pm we were flying over the South Pole and saw Antarctica at 33,000ft -60C deg which looked amazing, huge fissures in the ice and clear of cloud, which the crew said was unusual, so another tick on the "bucket list". We arrived at our hotel at Jo'burg airport to a complimentary SA port, a very nice introduction.