LEAKING FUEL TANKS AND THE MASAI MARA

18 June 2008

Day 109

Nairobi - Masai Mara (Riverside Campsite S1 26.309 E35 12.446)

403Km

SARAH: After more chatting to Phil and Judy over breakfast we were ready to leave at 10am. Then things got worse as I smelt some diesel and found our fuel tank was leaking! Great - another problem! But the Dutch couple, who've had a few leaks in their cruiser, told us to just monitor it and gave us some fibreglass to patch the tank if we needed to. The price of diesel has gone up 6Ksh in the last week and it's now over 1Euro/l and we are feeling a dent in our wallets every time we fill up and can't afford to have any leaking out! Since we had filled up yesterday Bruce feels the leak is at the top of the tank so we left for the Masai Mara.

We decided to enter at the Talek Gate which we'd been advised is the best gate to be around. But the road from Narok was horrendous! It wasn't corrugated but just completely eroded away with huge holes and ditches. A 4x4 was essential and thank goodness it hadn't rained yet. It took us an hour to do the first 30km and then the dirt road got really good and it took us another 2 hours to get to the Talek Gate and Riverside Camp which was super and just outside the park. Funnily enough the German man who recommended we come here and whom we'd met at Arches Post, happened to be here, so after chicken drumsticks on the braai we had a dink with Frans. He was horrified that we'd taken the bad road to the Talek Gate and said he meant for us to drive through the park to the gate! Whoops, but actually I'd recommend others to come this way as long as it hasn't been raining. Frans gave us some excellent info about where to go in the Mara and where he'd seen animals. The KWS officials so far have all been pretty useless at providing information about the park. The bush already seems more alive here with Hyena calls in the night.

MARVELOUS MASAI MARA

19 June 2008

Day 110

Masai Mara National Park (Riverside Campsite)

Km

Park Entrance Fee: 40$US pp

800Ksh 4x4

BRUCE: This morning I was woken up at 5am by lions roaring near by and hyena were also around. We were desperate to see lions so I woke Se up and told here that we were going into the park now and not at midday! We were in the park by 7am. The Masai Mara is awesome, both in scenery and the abundance of game. The low rolling hills are covered in long dry grass with the odd tree and the game is really easy to see. We saw lots of buffalo, antelope that we'd never seen, warties, hyena and lion. We crossed the Mara river and saw all the wildebeest sculls that litter the banks. We also saw crocs, huge crocs, hunting gazelle that were not quite stupid enough to drink. We also saw a servile cat hunting and spent the end of the day with the pride of lions that we'd seen earlier. What an absolutely awesome day and I can't wait to see the photos. We braaied a great rump steak for dinner and Frans came over and chatted. He's an interesting guy who worked for an aid agency selling wood stoves, got married at a drive through ceremony in Vegas and may still be a wanted German terrorist. Quite a lifetime! Tomorrow we'll do a short free game drive on a plain outside the park and then head to Navasha or Nakuru.

SNEAK SNEAK MASAI MARA

20 June 2008

Day 111

Masai Mara - Nakuru (Kembu Campsite S0 18.909 E35 53.530)

353Km

SARAH: It was another exciting day. From the Talek Gate we did a game drive along the Talek River which is actually inside the park but since you don't drive through the gate you don't need to pay. The river was beautiful and we kept gazing across the river to the Mara plains in envy. After a breakfast stop with us hopping in and out of the car we came across 4 lazy lions in the grass! So there is big game on this side of the river. We also saw buffalo, waterbuck, crocs and impala. We then found a track down the steep bank and across the river into the Masai Mara. The water level was low and there were fresh tyre tracks across so we spontaneously decided to chance it and sneak into the Masai Mara!

The river crossing was trickier than it looked with a steep climb on the other side, but we made it easily and luckily no cars were around to see us! What an adrenalin rush! Once in the park we didn't see as much as yesterday but we still saw loads and a long line of zebra crossing the sand river from Tanzania to Kenya. I really wish we were here for the migration as it would be incredible to witness. We saw a different pride of lion and by now we are quite complacent about lion and 'the usual' game. We snuck back out of the park at about 3pm and again no one saw us! At this stage neither of us were thinking straight and we decided to drive the 300km to Nakuru. It had started raining lightly and sections of the black cotton soil road were unbelievable slippery but we made it to the tar road just before the heavy rains. We'd hoped the road to Nakuru was tarred and the first 20km were, but it then turned to a pot-holed dirt road. It was now dark, wet, raining and misty and to top it off we were driving right through the area where there had been trouble with the elections earlier in the year. It was a stupid thing to do but we had to push on and thank goodness the last 40km were tar again. We made it safely to Kembu camp by 10pm and were so exhausted from our action packed day we collapsed into bed.

21 June 2008

Day 112

Nakuru (Kembu Campsite)

0km

BRUCE: We had a real lie in this morning and only got up at about 10am! We relaxed around the camp and went down to a little craft market that they were having on the farm. They even had a little fly tying station there. I got talking to the owner of Kembu Campsite there, who is a keen fly fisherman and apparently there are bone fish off Lamu Island. Pity we have not got the time to go there. He also told me about some big yellows on the Nile at Jinja and I think I'm going to try and give those a go. We spent the evening looking through out Kenya photos and made a great bolognaise for dinner.

LAKE NAKURU NATIONAL PARK

22 June 2008

Day 113

Lake Nakuru National Park (Kembu Campsite)

Km

Park entrance fees: 40$US pp

300Ksh car

SARAH: We were excited for another NP and were in the gates by 7am looking for leopard in the fever tree forest. Lake Nakuru NP is beautiful and so different to the other parks we've been to. The lake is stunning with pink flamingos and pelicans gathered in it. Since the NP runs all around the lake we saw a lot of animals around it's swampy edge - buffalo, rhino, hyena, waterbuck, zebra and swamp donkey. We also saw lots of Marabu Stork which we think looks like Drew. The most exciting park of the day was seeing White Rhino up close and 3 different lion sightings. Stopping under trees for lunch Bruce saw 2 lion lying in the bush about 100meters away. Since they were so difficult to see several cars and matatus drove past without stopping and we didn't say anything wanting our lions all to ourselves. We were hoping to watch a kill unfold as a lone buffalo and then an impala walked towards the lions but they were not hungry. After a drink at the stunning Lake Nakuru Lodge we went back to the lion and saw another lioness appear from the bush and we followed her to a watering hole where she drank. It was great! We still didn't spot a leopard in the evening but had had a really good day. Back at Kembu campsite we had left over mince and rice and are trying to convince Dee and Drew to meet us in Malawi. This is nearly the end of Kenya as we head towards the Ugandan border from here.

ODD ELDORET AND AN AWESOME CAMPSITE

23 June 2008

Day 114

Nakuru - Eldoret (Naiberi Riverside Campsite N0 26.872 E35 25.341)

176Km

BRUCE:Last night I had arranged to see Andrew, the owner of Kembu and a keen fisherman, for coffee at 7:30am before he had to head into town. We chatted fishing over a coffee and the odd Belgian guys came over with some advise about the route to Uganda and south. I did a few odd jobs on the Landy, fixed a hole in the exhaust, replaced bolts on the ladder to the roof rack and tightened up the bull bar.

The road to Eldoret was hell, full of potholes where it was not a diversion across rough corrugated tracks. We got to Eldoret at about 2pm and stopped in town to do a little supplies shop and draw some cash. I waited in the Landy while Se went into the shop and I was soon surrounded by a group of kids all high on glue and begging. Eldoret is the only place in Kenya that has a tense atmosphere about it. The people all look at each other suspiciously and we saw lots of shouting and arguing. I'm not sure if it has become like this since the lection trouble, when a church with 50 people inside it was burnt down, or if it has always been this way.

The campsite is a totally different affair though and is located about 15km east of town. It is a huge place really geared for overland trucks and we had our own parking bay, water, covered sitting and braai area and there is a great bar and swimming pool too where Se did some lengths. Great stop! We had another braai for dinner and went through our photos of Kenya in the bar later on. An overland truck had arrived too and we spent some time chatting to the other travellers.

TO UGANDA!!

24 June 2008

Day 115

Eldoret - Jinja, Uganda (Nile River Explorers Campsite N0 29.054 E33 09.798)

293Km

SARAH: We beat the truck traffic and were on the road at 6.30am heading to the Ugandan border. This was the easiest border yet and taking advantage of being a white tourist we scooted past the 2km line of waiting trucks. We declined any help and were stamped out of Kenya in about 15mins. Getting into Uganda would have been even quicker if the Customs Official had been there. He wasn't at work yet so we had to call him to stamp Ubhejane into Uganda. After paying 50$US for a visa each and showing them our Comesa 3rd party insurance we were through. I thought the Kenyans were friendly but the Ugandans were even friendlier. The road to Jinja wasn't bad at all and we made it to the source of the White Nile at Lake Victoria. We've haven't seen the white nile since the confluence of the Niles in Khartoum! We have got a great view of it and it's powerful rapids from our campsite. The white water rafting looks awesome but at 125$US it's too expensive. The campsite was buzzing with overlanding trucks who'd all been rafting that day so we joined them for a few beers in the evening. After Bruce dropped his second beer on the floor we decided it was bedtime.

SUMMARY OF KENYA

Diesel: 95Ksh/l

Exchange rate: 67Ksh:1$ US

Beer: 150Ksh at campsites, 100Ksh at Jungle Junction and 75Ksh at Nakumatt

Border crossing: 45mins in / 15mins out

HIGHLIGHTS OF KENYA

1. Masai Mara and sneaking in
2. Nakumatt supermarket
3. Game parks
4. Crossing the Equator
5. Meeting travellers at Jungle Junction
6. Trout Tree Restaurant
7. No hassle from generally well educated Kenyans

LOWLIGHTS OF KENYA

1. Expensive diesel
2. Moyale Road

WE LOVED KENYA!