Elephants on the path 19 April, 2008

That’s twice then. Twice we’ve been in parks, once in South Africa (Pilanesburg) and once here, where we’ve gone out early in the day to find elephant, had a great day seeing lots of other animals and birds, given up on the elephants in sorrow, and had them literally block our passage within half a kilometer of the park exit.

You don’t get elephant in Nairobi Park down the road from where we live, which is why it’s so important to make the effort when you are in a park to try to find them. After a few hours you assume they are actively hiding from you, that several-thousand-tonne elephant herd.  So it’s peculiar when you do suddenly run into dozens of animals – the largest land mammals, remember – and they simply wander round you, as though you might be a termite mound. They aren’t hiding, they don’t care that you’re there, they just carry on doing their stuff.

“Their stuff” is destruction. We sat open-mouthed watching the elephants simply rip a swathe through an acre of euclea, smashing down branches, ripping off leaves. That’s why they don’t fit in Nairobi Park, and why they make bad neighbours for farmers. These are animals who need a lot of vegetation and that means a lot of space.

Sleepy rhino, protective chimp 18 April, 2008

Second day at Sweetwaters, and a superb game drive.

We woke at first light (or, more specifically, Anisa woke at first light, as she always does, and quickly spread her field of wakefulness over the rest of us). After admiring the top of Mt Kenya – usually mist-wraithed, even this close – we had breakfast and went for a game drive.

One of the first things we did is go to meet Morani the tame black rhino. Sweetwaters is a rhino breeding and conservation centre and has eight rare white rhino and 77 of the even-rarer black rhino. For children the star and poster-child among these black rhino is Morani who, by virtue of three periods of remedial care at the Daphne Sheldrick elephant (and rhino) orphanage, just down the road from us at home in Langata, has become tame. Maybe you couldn’t say he ‘loves’ people, but he can ignore them like a champion.

We found him taking his morning nap. This, as far as we can discern, starts pretty much as soon as he wakes up, and carries on into the late morning or afternoon. Then, sun-warmed, he gets up and eats massively and continuously until it’s time to sleep again. This means that our photographs all look as though he is dead, but he isn’t – he’s resting, huffing and sighing occasionally, barely flinching when patted or even when Anisa accidentally stuck her elbow in his eye.

His horns were removed a couple of years ago. Our friends the Guitons have a photo of him with his horn, a beautiful slim dagger, and a dark suspicion forms that the sawn-off stumps might indicate that Morani does have a less-tame side to him, but the official story is that they were cut off when he got them tangled in a tree. It’s probably safer to stick to that line.

In the afternoon we reached the chimp sanctuary. There are no wild chimps in Kenya but, over the years, Sweetwaters has taken in a variety of orphaned, abused or imprisoned chimps from Rwanda, Burundi, the DRC and other places where they do still live in the wild. These extraordinary creatures, each with a sad story and probably psychological damage, have nearly 300 acres in which to roam.

We meet three chimps chasing each other around doing roly-polies and our three kids are delighted. Then two of the chimps clear off leaving Ezo, a male saved in southern Sudan. His mood changes and the most important thing to him is to mark his territory and threaten us, which he does very thoroughly, running up and down the length of the five metre electric fence between us, beating it with a stick. Needless to say, after a little hesitation, our kids are even more impressed with this display. Kira spends the rest of the day imitating Ezo, despite our warnings that the warders may think she has escaped and return her to a cage.

Sweetwaters game reserve 17 April, 2008

Jane’s birthday today, so we set off today for three nights at Sweetwaters Camp, in a private game reserve west of Nanyuki, roughly between Mt Kenya and the Aberdares. It’s around four hours leisurely drive from Nairobi. We made it all the way with a chocolate birthday cake intact, a small complication to the travel and a secret which the children found great fun.

Sweetwaters has some history to it – there is a European oak on site planted by Edward Prince of Wales. It was once owned by businessman Tiny Rowland. The Serene Hotels chain now runs the luxury tented camp. They do a good job. The quality of the construction and upkeep is excellent, and the staff training is second to none that we have experienced in Kenya. Better, a considerable amount of effort has gone into making sure the camp supports the ecological conservation of the game reserve.

The waterhole which the tents overlook has a resident population of storks, cranes, ibis and impala, and is visited by zebra, giraffe, gazelle and warthogs. The park has a still-wider population, including all the Kenyan ‘big five’, and is a bird-watcher’s paradise. (See the gallery for some more shots.)

More on the trip tomorrow.