Though the Christmas season is over, I guess it’s not too late for my holiday blog. I was lucky enough to get a week vacation from my language study and travel to Kenya to spend Christmas on safari with the family. I left Morocco and flew to Brussels, where I spent the night and adjusted back into what seemed like such a foreign world. The first thing that shocked me was snow, and lots of it. In my rush to pack, I merely thought about what to bring to Kenya (a place that was going to be warmer than Morocco) and so, forgot a heavy jacket for my night in Brussels. However, upon seeing the snow and all the Christmas lights, I braved the weather and went into downtown Brussels. The whole city was lit up like a fairy tale and every street corner, there were vendors selling everything from hot cider, to chocolate covered waffles, I even saw a burrito stand. After I purchased a strong glass of cider (to help deal with the cold) and proceeded to walk around the city and take in the sights. It was my first time in Brussels and it was a nice way to get into the holiday spirit.
After spending the Brussels, I woke up early to meet the rest of my family at the airport to fly to Nairobi. It was great to see them and catch up before the 7-hour plane ride.
We arrived in Nairobi at around midnight and went straight to the hotel. It was my first time in East Africa and I was eager to see the city, but it was the middle of the night and streets were empty. After arriving in the hotel, I agreed with my family that now was not the time to explore, and after the long plane ride, the comfortable hotel bed was calling my name.
We awoke the next morning and saw the sights of Nairobi. Nairobi is infamous for its traffic, and luckily we had a driver who helped us navigate around it. At first I was overwhelmed by how developed and sprawling Nairobi seemed. There were high-rises, fast food chains and people everywhere. Our first stop was the elephant orphanage. (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/40709206#40709206) As we waited with the rest of the excited tourist, a pack of baby elephants came sprinting out of the brush. They had one goal in mind: the bottles that their trainers were holding. In about 30 seconds each elephant downed two huge bottles of some sort of formula. After that we spent about 40 minutes watching the elephants play around with each other and stay in the mud. Afterwards we went and visited the home of Karen Blixen, who was the inspiration for the film Out of Africa. It was still decorated and even had some of the same furniture as when she lived there.
Afterwards, we had a nice dinner at the hotel and went to sleep early in preparation for our flight out to Amboseli National Park. Amboseli is famous for having lots of elephants, and lots of elephants we did see. After taking off in our tiny, tiny airplane we landed on some sort of mixture of dirt that appeared to be some version of a runway. For someone with a fear of flying, I was not amused. However, we made it safely and were greeted by our guide Ali. We rode in a Landcruiser that was open completely open on all sides and almost immediately we started finding animals. At first it was just a few birds, ostridge and some buffalos, but the further we got into the national park, the more animals we started to find. I still remember so clearly seeing the first giraffe, we drove right near him and he continued to munch away on his grass, as if we weren’t even there. After a few hours of animal watching, we arrived at the camp where we would be staying. It was absolutely secluded and consisted of about 15 tents. Each tent has its own bathroom and shower (which was especially necessary after a plane right and 4 hours on safari). We got settled in our rooms and then went out again to look for animals in the afternoon. At night, we enjoyed a nice relaxing dinner overlooking a watering hole. We then used our flashlights to find our way back down the hill and to our tents for the night. It was pretty refreshing not having any internet, television or electronics to play with. It was probably the best sleep I’d had in years.
After spending another day at Amboseli, we packed up and headed back to the airport to take another one of the small airplanes and travel to Masai Mara where would spend Christmas and the next few days.
However, the highlight of the time in Amboseli (and a good story to show off how close you really are to the animals) was one morning my Mom came over to my brother and my tent to see if we needed something. She left her tent unzipped. About five seconds after she left our tent, my brother and I heard a scream. It was my Mom as a little monkey ran passed her, cookies in hand. When my Dad asked her if the monkey stole a cookie, my mom replied “He stole all the cookies!” as if the real issue wasn’t that there was a monkey in her tent, but that the monkey had not stolen one cookie, but all of them. The monkey then proceeded to sit on top of the tent and enjoy each cookie in front of us. My brother and I subsequently shared our cookies with my Mom.
No comments:
Post a Comment