G'day there, Well having arrived in Sydney a couple of days ago I thought I should take the opportunity of being back in proper email contact and finish off the Kenyan adventure. I left off after our relaxing few days back at the house in Baringo. Well Nairobi we visited the David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust. Here they look after orphaned elephants and rhinos and try to get them back into the wild. They only open for one hour a day to minimise the amount of time that they are around lots of humans. They have a few human 'mums' that look after them, these people have often been working there for up to 16 years, continuity of care is important. It's been known for old handlers to go out into the bush and the grown up elephants who they used to work with to come up and greet them. An elephant never forgets! There were 5 young elephants ranging between about 5 months and 2 years old. One of which was rescued when it was found trying to get milk out of its dead mother. It was lovely to see them but all very sad that there has to be such a place, poaching is still a big problem out here. If any of you watched elephant diaries then this is where some of the elephants are. Do go look on http://www.sheldrickwildlifetrust.org/ to find out more about it all. In the afternoon Gill and I went to the Karen Blixen Museum (the writer of Out of Africa - amongst other books) which is in her house. It must have been so different then when the town was not so built up around it all. I feel now like I need to read the books again so I can truly appreciate what life was like out here at that time. That evening after dinner Jonathan (Tanya and Mouses' Dad) caught the noisy toads from the pond in the middle of the courtyard to relocate them.... They were soooo loud! He left the little tree frogs though; they make a rather nicer sound! Rather funny having a bucket of toads in the bath, when you lifted the towel over the bucket to have a look they made a damn good effort of trying to jump out. The next day off to work he went with a briefcase in one hand and a box of toads in the other!! I think they ended up a few blocks away in a ditch! Tanya's mum came over from the UK, it's the first time she's been back in 13 years so it was great fun taking her around to catch up with old friends. We went on the Monday to visit their uncle Philip and his new wife Katie. They live right up in the hills miles away from anyone else. Quite interesting directions given by their cousin on how to get there, take the road out of Nairobi past the Ngong Hills... then turn left at the World Vision Sign... then follow the track for about 30 mins until you get to the left hand track that goes up to the particularly green part of the escarpment!!!.... hmm..... well...... one wrong turn and a very bumpy ride we managed to get the car halfway up the hill (mouse driving and the rest of us walking to save the underside of the car getting trashed on the rocks - we had to walk ahead to remove the particularly big rock!!!) In the end someone had run up to alert Philip of our arrival and he came to rescue us in his 4x4! They run a jewellery business called Zulugrass - go look on 'Google' for the Leakey Collection. It's really cool stuff made out of local grass cut and dyed mixed with glass beads! Anyways, they employ the local rural Kenyans and try to educate them in business practice etc... it's a really great set up and they seem to be doing really well, the women make up the necklaces under trees in the bush. They were a really lovely friendly couple and their house is amazing. A collection of different sized huts the dining hut with an open side over looking the valley. The bathroom was amazing, round without a total roof on in it with a massive deep sunken bath, trees and plants growing up inside it.... Very hard to describe - you'd have to see it to believe it! From their house we drove up to Lake Magadi a soda lake, there were flamingos and enormous marabou storks there. They collect the salt here and make lots of money therefore there is a really good road all the way out to the lake so that the Lorries can get to and from the factory. The next day (Tuesday) was Gill's last day in Kenya. We spent the morning at the Langata Giraffe Centre it is run as an educational centre by the African Fund for Endangered Wildlife, started in the 1972 by the Leslie-Melville's for Rothschild Giraffes. They rescue injured or abandoned Giraffes and also breed them to release them back into the wild. They aim to raise money so that they can educate local children about the importance of protecting local wildlife and to discourage poaching. From there we went to another market.... They have been interesting experiences. Not like any other sort of shopping I've done before. You get hassled by everyone as you walk in the street and if you look at anything they ask you how much you want to buy it for. Then you start haggling and realise after you've handed over your money that you probably didn't want whatever it was in the first place! Gill and I have fully graduated from the Tanya and Mouse Leakey School of bartering and will not spend more than 300 Kenyan shillings for a kikoy..... (large colourful material worn in a wrap around skirt bought for about 3 pounds over here and sold in the UK for about 25 pounds!!!!!). It's very entertaining watching the girls at work and it's a definite advantage being with people who can speak Swahili... the prices mysteriously drop when they realise that they are Kenyan! Before we dropped Gill off at the airport we had dinner at 'Carnivore' an amazing restaurant where you get to eat a LOT OF MEAT! They've had to alter their menu slightly over the last few years and it's no longer possible to get zebra (jolly good thing too I say) however we did get to try camel (yuck...very strong and tastes like the dust it's been walking through all day) crocodile.. (ok... but not good after to many mouthfuls and very odd bones to watch out for) ostrich (had it before in Louth and was by far the nicest of them all.....) then all the usual beef, lamb, chicken, turkey etc.... my god after all that lot we could hardly move! ..... Rushed to get Gill onto her plane and wave her off back to the UK to start her PGCE. Very odd not to be getting on the plane too..... Guess this is really real now, I'm really not going back for quite a few months! We drove back up to Baringo the next day to wash our clothes and pack up our bags for a weekends camping trip. Mouse also had to pack all her stuff for her return to uni in the Uk after the big wedding. A cousin of theirs got married this weekend in Lamu on the coast and there was a mass exodus of the family by plane and road with lots of food and even dogs! Before this though we went Nigel and Janie's farm (Tanya's step brother's place where we'd been before) for the night before we drove off to Meru Park for my birthday weekend camping in the bush. We met up with Murray (the guy from El Karama and the lion chase!) in Nanyuki to stock up on food and switch into his 4x4, it was a tight squeeze with all the camping stuff, food for us, and also veggies that we were taking to the park warden, everytime we went over a pothole or a sleeping policeman I had to grab the tray of eggs and stop all of the fruit and veg from covering everyone. Quite and entertaining ride, the road towards the park is in the process of being built, and they've only got another 300 m from last year when Murray visited the park! Meru Park is one of the less visited of the parks due to really bad poaching diminishing the stocks of wildlife. They are doing a lot of work at the moment to try and get it back on track. The bonus was that we only met one bus of school kids on one day out of the four that we were there for!!! Brilliant. We (Murray, Mouse Tanya and I) met up with a couple who are friends of Murray and their kid and their NQT (Newly Qualified Teacher) Tamsin from the UK. She had just finished this summer and had studies in Exmouth! The campsite (or rather 'clearing') was by a river and had some of the largest thorns I had ever seen in my life. The thorns on the trees here grow in pairs in right angles and if you hold your hand out in front of you some of them are as large as you thumb and forefinger when held out in an L shape.... Try getting one of those out of your foot through your sandal. Ouch.... I decided that perhaps long trousers and trainers were the best way to avoid these in the dark whilst trying to get back to your tent across the minefield! They had a big campfire set up which was lovely, but because we'd arrived late and spent an hour putting up our tent (we'd borrowed it off Nigel and had never seen it before nor knew how to put it up.... It was a five poled dome tent!!.....and we had to clear the thorns away in the dark!) by the time we got around the camp fire we couldn't be bothered to cook or find the right plates and bowls etc. Mouse and I dug out the Weetabix and a big cooking pot and made up 8 Weetabix and chopped up banana which the four of us shared with the one spoon we could find! Tee hee.... The next morning was my 23rd Birthday. I opened up my cards and presents in my tent (Thank you so much for them all!  ) and then we joined the others around the campfire for an amazing brunch. Started off with watermelon which is my favourite! We played lots of games of cards and ludo with Claudia to keep her amused. It was a grey day and we kept having spots of rain. Probably a good thing though since it can get really hot here. We headed out for an afternoon Game Drive, visited the Hippo pool where we watched about 5 hippos wallowing around in the water. Then found a group of really large elephants. Got up really close to them, it was amazing, they really are enormous. I could have stayed on the roof of the Landover for hours watching them. It was an entertaining day, fuelled by beer and safari cane and coke.... Tee hee.... Ended up trying to do shadow impressions of the animals in the park and we drove along the dusty track on the roof.... Tan and I were getting rather good at buffalo! A very different birthday!!!  Woke up the next morning from a dream about a snake around my neck.. thought it was about time I got up!! It was a lot hotter today and we all headed down to the river and sat in the water slowly emptying the crate of beer that we had cooling in the water. On croc watch at the same time! Had a siesta after our busy morning (ha ha).... Then went off on a dusk drive to see what animals were about. Beautiful giraffes, storks in the water and buffalos etc etc.... fab. That evening we got to eat the lion kill from when we'd stayed on Murray's ranch! Had a large slab of beef that we slow cooked in tin foil in the fire for about 3 hours.... Delish! Lovely to sit nattering around the campfire till late with the stars above us. That night Tanya woke up in the middle of the night to go for a pee, I woke up too and was wondering whether I might go as well..... as I was lying there thinking about going back to sleep I heard a noise outside.... I asked Tanya what she thought it was, "oh, that's a leopard and a baboon......"!!!!!!!! Suddenly, I decided that staying exactly where I was would be the better plan! Amazing listening to them, I may not have seen a leopard on my trip out here but I heard one near my tent.. That's good enough for me! That next morning at breakfast time around the campfire whilst we were digging into our eggs and bacon there was a grunting panting sound from the bush...... there were sets of lions who were communicating to each other from either side of the camp! I knew they were probably further away than they sounded, but still, piggy in the middle of lions is not good! It was amazing to be camping right in the thick of it all. Beats the Lincolnshire Wolds (sorry!!!)!  It was a long drive back to Nairobi that night and when we got there Tanya and Mouse had to pack up for their drive to the coast the next day and I had to pack to get my flight to Sydney. So, here I am now in Sydney. I'm kipping on the floor of my friend Madeline's room at Uni. She smuggles me into the canteen for food too which is great. Have had a relaxing few days washing everything I own (all got so dusty in Africa!) catching up on sleep etc. Luckily am not suffering from any jet lag. I actually managed to sleep on the flight over which is a first for me, it really makes a difference. My first full day here was grey and raining and cold and made me feel like I was in London on a cold wet October evening..... yuck.... However it has now brightened up and things are looking good! Have just sent emails out to friends of friends who are out here to see if I can meet up with them in Sydney. I have booked flights to Tasmania for two weeks. I can't wait to see everyone over there, it will be brilliant. I hope to do a bit of walking whilst I'm out there with my mate Jen who worked in the outdoor education department. Will be staying with the Blaxland's for a while too which will be great. I'm really excited about it all. Looks like I'll be heading out to NZ around the 19th October for a two week tour of the south island.... From there on in I really haven't a clue! I'll keep in touch to keep you posted re: my whereabouts! I really hope you are all well, do keep emailing me about what you are up to. I really don't want to loose touch with you while I'm away! Much love to all, Zoë xx