From Lake Navaisha we made our way to the Masai Mara - a large game reserve in Southern Kenya.

The first night was spent in Ilongwe campsite just outside the town of Narok. The interesting thing about Narok is that it was one of the worst scenes of violence in the recent election troubles with people being killed in the streets by spears. Driving through it now you wouldn't have a clue - happy scenes of people buying veg in the markets and shouting 'Jambo!' to us as we passed by (Swahili for Hello).

The campsite itself was stunning - surrounded by wildebeast and zebra which we could hear through the night. The only shock I got was when Kim went to the ladies loo and nearly got knocked over by a swarm of bats flying out!!!!!! Sitting outside round a campfire drinking a very tasty Tusker beer (produced in Kenya) was absolutely magical! The camping itself though is taking a bit of getting used to!

We had two game drives in the Masai Mara and saw a family of elephants and a pride of lions, along with antelope (including Elland, Thompsons Gazelle and Topi). The pride of lions was sitting sunning itself right by the road and one male lion was so hot he decided to shelter under our truck....as he was sat under our seats we were virtually eyeballing each other!!!

The second night camping was right on the edge of the game reserve in Riverside camp... and when we say on the edge edge you should know that there are no fences round the game reserve so we were half expecting to get eaten by a hyena when we went to the loo in the night!!! This campsite was wilder than the others with Mark sharing the shower with a hornets nest - interesting!

A visit to a Maasai village completed our trip to the Mara - fascinating to watch the tribal pogo dancing! We even went into one of the huts and was astounded to note that each tiny hut had corridors and even a guest room for anyone who needed a bed for the night - I'm not sure we're that hospitable in the UK! Winston, one of the Maasai warriors explained that he had just been searching for his cow that he thought had been eaten by lions - a common thing to happen apparently!