 |
| Glenn's Journal for 10-29-02 - Tsavo West This morning we opted to sleep in and have breakfast before departing for Tsavo West. We agreed to meet Richard at 8:45 am where we would have our game drive as we were leaving for Tsavo. Well little did we know that the reason we were leaving around 9:00 am is so we could caravan with other companies. The reason for the caravan was that we were driving through a bad section of the country where there had been known robberies of single vehicles leaving people stranded without money or vehicle. The caravan of 11 vans was required to have policemen with them. They added 3 or 4 police into the cars in strategic positions including ours as we were the last van in the caravan. After finally departing around 9:30 am we pretty much stuck together. We made one stop at a curio shop for a break before taking back out. The ride lasted approximately 3 hours before reaching the entrance into Tsavo West. Once at the gate each van was allowed to go on its own. We also dropped off the policeman at the entrance as well for the afternoon caravan back to Amboseli. Richard took us to Mzima Springs where we stopped for lunch and enjoyed a short walk along the river with a guide. The guide shared with us information about the river, the vegetation, and some of the wildlife including watching the hippos and a few crocodiles. The springs are created by an underground runoff from Mt. Kilimanjaro and runs for over 20 kilometers. They even have an underwater viewing tank where you can enjoy the underwater life in their natural habitat. Tsavo is the largest national park in Kenya with over 20,000 square kilometers of land. Tsavo had a lot of brush for the animals to hide in which made viewing quite tough. We finished our game drive around 2:30 pm and checked into our lodge. The lodge was very nice (again not as nice as Samburu) and with our room on the second floor we had a great view of the watering hole and the beautiful mountains that the lodge looks out over. We spent the afternoon relaxing (Erin took a nap while I watched the watering hole) before cleaning up for dinner. Dinner was enjoyable as we had a table overlooking the water hole. It was a little quiet at the water hole tonight due to the fact that it had rained this afternoon, which sometimes provides enough water for the animals to drink without having to visit this water hole. We had met some folks from Finland during our stop at the curio shop and we saw them again at dinner. After dinner we joined them for some conversation as they were just beginning their safari and we were just ending ours. We shared e-mails and said goodnight around 10:00 pm. Tomorrow we are heading back to Nairobi to stay. |
| Can you spot the croc? These guys are well concealed near the water, and are the #2 cause of animal-related deaths in Kenya. #1? Hippos. |