Jambo Dear Friends,

Today I want to share our Safari that my team from Venice Church of the Nazarene and I took for 3 days.
It was far too short as there is so much to see and there was no rest. Up at 6:00 every morning to get out there to see what happened last night as that is when the lions make there kill and also everything is waking up and starting to move.

Here is part of the team as we are leaving for a morning Safari.

The mornings are cool and the weather the entire trip was beautiful except for the day we got there. At 4:00 pm went out to see what was out there and we ran into a pride of lioness that were looking at a very large herd of cape buffalo. They couldn't make up there mind which one to target but kept inching up. Two of them were the leaders I presume and were at the ends of the others further ahead of the others.

                                                           Then the rain came and I think it dampened there spirits and ours also. It got very cold so we finally left them still looking hungrily at the herd. 
Our guide said this is a rarity to see a whole pride of lionesses like this. In all I counted 8 of them.  Of course there was not a male in site as they let the women do all the work and then show up to eat.

It seemed like this whole Safari  was a series of rare sightings. The next we saw was a whole family of elephants the youngest was about 2 weeks old and so cute.

In this whole family there were about 8 some teens and some kids. Then of course this baby.

Next was a and I am not sure of the term but will say a group of giraffes. This again our driver said was a rare sighting to see this many in one area. There were 16 and I could only get 14 in my lens and we were a ways away when we saw them. Again look at the sizes in all ages. AMAZING!




The air was quite dusty as the winds were blowing at about 20 mph and made the air smoggy.

They are so graceful and beautiful. All of these giraffes are Masai. There are 3 different giraffes and are found in different parts of Kenya.
I love there eye lashes, they are so long. Down below you can see the Masai pattern.










Next was a cheetah that had made a kill . Of course the cheetah is the fasts animal and no one is going to out run it, as is proof in this picture. I think this was a Giselle.

What a beautiful creature and look at the  muscle in the top of the leg and shoulders.

You feel so at peace out here with the stillness of the plains and the silence of the animals. We saw acres of savanna grass that waved in the breezes and looked like a sea of waves.  God is so creative. 

Vulture

 Below is a truly unusual sighting. I have looked for
what this is as there were more than one which would have
been a form of albino which they call leucism. I found a
possible connection to the Hanadryas Baboon and it looks like
this is it. The only problem is that it is not suppose to be
in this area.  They were with a whole family of about 12 and the white one was huge. Notice the baby under the mother. That is the other
characteristic, the baby is born brown and then turns blonde.

Lilac Breasted Roller

Baby Vervet Monkey

Adult Vervet Monkey

 What they have in there hands is sugar cane. Dave on our team stopped to buy some and thought the monkeys would like it. Oh boy did they!

Monarch Lizard

Helmeted Guineafowl

The lizard was in the back of our lodge sunning himself. He is
                                                          about 4' long and quite husky.

Here I am becoming a Masai Warrior or something funny looking. We did have a good time with them. 

This was at the Masai Village at Masai Mara .
We were introducing ourselves around and someone said this is Sharon and I turned and they were talking about the other Sharon. I asked if it was her Christian name and she said no it was her given name. Which I find hard to believe as they all I think have Masai names.






We were ending our Safari one night and coming home a  dusk and spotted this strange cat. Our driver right away said it is a Serval Cat and very rare which when I looked it up he is right. They are not on the endangered list yet but if things don't change and they make an effort to save them it could be soon that they will be extinct. They can run 50 mph and leap horizontally 12'.


Well dear followers I will say La La Salama until next time. Remember to look around you for Gods creations no matter where you are. They are there and oh so beautiful ! We were so blessed to see so many unusual animals and have this time with nature.

Bless You All,
Sharon

Continuation of Nairobi National Park

These are the graceful Impala with horns in the shape of a lyre and ears that are very large. You can tell  its an Impala by the M on it's rear end. The female has no horns.

Below are Common Eland's they are the biggest of the antelopes and can weigh up to a ton. Both male and female have horns.

If you look behind the Eland you will see ANU with the red roof. That is how close we are to the park.

The Secretary Bird is very large  about 36" high and weighs about 8lbs. with a wing span of 6 ft. The name is  Arabic and means hunter bird. When the head feather come up it is like a crown on the back of the head .

So we are at the end of pictures and here we find the area of where the kill took place and there came the lion we never saw the kill only to think it was well eaten by now as we got there by about 9:30 am and he was the last lion and he was heading home for a siesta with a full belly. You really need to get up at 6:00 when the park opens to see more animals but we were fortunate to see 2 the lion and the buffalo of the big 5. So now hopefully on my Safari with the team when we go to Masai Mara I will see the Elephant, Rino & Cheetah. 

So when I got home I decided to do laundry. This is what I saw as I went to the laundry area. He is a Agama Lizard and it is a male as the female is dull in color.

So this was the end of a wonderful day with nature. God is so good and makes such beautiful creatures in our world. When is the last time you really looked at your surroundings? Isn't it beautiful.


La La Salama & Blessings,

Sharon

Jambo Followers,

Today I would like to take you to Nairobi National Park. The park is very near ANU in fact on the edge of it as you will see in the pictures. ANU was purchased from the Masai and is at the edge of their land. The fee to get into the park for Mazoongoo's is $50 and for our driver $5 yes we support Kenya with high fees, but it is worth it.

At the entrance to the park the lady says there has been a kill over night and the lions are at #8 and stay to the left all the way. Well as soon as we got into the park we saw animals, which I was surprised at. Yes, that is Nairobi in the background. Hard to believe you are in the middle of a game reserve. The park cover 29,000 acres and is one of the smallest parks in Africa.

The giraffe you see is a Masai Giraffe and is only found in Kenya & Tanzania. The male is about 18 ft. high and the female about 16ft. high. The pattern of there coat is very distinctive as it is a jagged effect and the color is deep rich copper brown. The other two Giraffes are the Reticulated and the Rothschild with a distinct different pattern and color. 
      

                                                         

As we pulled around a bend there was a pond with all these varies birds, but the one that stood out was the Grey Crowned Crane standing at about 5 ft. tall what a site only God could make something this beautiful. There were also spoon bills, egrets, ibis. Then we saw a crocodile and as you see the one is looking into the water and they started to move. What a beautiful wing span. We never did see the crocodile again. Good thing for the birds. There a 3 kinds of crocks in Africa this one was a Zaire which inhabits small ponds. In the pond there were several hipo but the were under water most of the time and hard to get in a photo.
These elegant beast are called Coke's Hartebeest
and are part of the Antelope family. We saw many as we drove through the park.
                                                          

Hartebeest

This is what part of the park was like driving through it narrow dirt roads. There were not many cars on the road. I guess the natives look at the park as a good place for all these bad animals to be as they are mostly there enemies as  eat or ruin there crops if they are farmers. Yes the whole park is surrounded by electric fence and is almost impossible for them to escape. You see I said almost. Last year when I was here a lioness escaped and causing quite a stir in Karen. Karen is a very well to do area with million dollar homes. They did finally tranquilizer her and get her back to the park. Have no idea how she got out maybe just went through or over the electric fence.

This to me was so unusual to see there were many breeds of animals all congregated in this area I mean probably 75 or more. Here were Hartebeest, Zebra, Gazelle and Impala all together.

.

 Zebras are probably one of my favorite animals because they are so unique. Did you know that no two Zebras are alike with there stripping? Pretty amazing that is there DNA. Above a mom and her baby. The female is more brown than black on the stripes. This is the Plains Zebra. The other breed of
Zebra is called the Grevy's which are found in northern Kenya and Ethiopia. The white stripes are very narrow and they have big ears.

 Can you believe this one, right in front of the car look at him prancing. The female is a gray brown color and not very pretty as far as color and markings. The male stands at between 7-8 ft. and weighs 150 lbs. The Masai has a pink neck and legs. The Somali's have blue necks and legs.
The worlds fastess bird that can run 40 mph.

This is the Nyati Bufallo and I believe this is a female. They weigh about 1500 lbs. and don't look freindly. We were very close to them and I thought I hope there not upset with us taking pictures.

I have just found out I have run out of space so this is to be continued on the following blog which I will atempt to do now as I want you to see the finale of our trip.


TO BE CONTINUED................

Lake Magadi

Jambo, Dear Followers,

Today I am going to take you to Lake Magadi, no I did not name it. This is a name I find quite often here. One of the Pastors name  is Magaya . So who knows where my husband was from. I am also getting a possible India connection. The pastor is not a Mazoongoo ( white ) so who knows.

We start out on our trip with two other NIV's from Idaho George and Terre and our driver Henry and Oruta who is another one of the drivers and had called to ask if he could go as he has never been there. 

The first picture is the road we were traveling on as you see by the truck coming at us there is room for 2 small cars but not a truck so it is chicken time and you can guess who gives. 


About half way there we see about 5 women standing by the road with very large yellow jugs and Henry asked if we could stop and I said yes. The women were preparing to walk to Magadi to get there water which is about 30 miles from where they live and then walk back with these heavy jugs.
So we said yes we will take the jugs and fill them and bring them back in about 4 hours. This is the group of women.


This picture of the two old ladies is cool especially as the one is breast feeding someones baby. I asked about this and was told that they interchange with mothers and who ever is free takes on that responsibility. Also was taken back by the fact that I didn't think we could breast feed at this age but you can it only takes a couple of weeks to get primed. No thanks!

  As we get closer to the Lake Magadi we are looking at quite a large lake and a desert look which reminded me of the Salt flats in the US.

 You must pass through a gate to enter there city and once through we pulled up along the road and out of no where there appeared a Masai guy about 20 and he said I am a guide and will take you to the hot springs. So after some negotiations we left and started our short trip to the springs. 

The lake is sodium and the plant here owns all the land and the lake. They manufacture bottled soda and it is trucked into Nairobi and other towns. Also they have a railroad that takes the products to Mombasa for shipping around the world. The natives use the dried salt they scrape up from the flats when it is dry season to store there meat in. During the rainy season this is covered by water.

 This is the plant and behind it is a mountain in Tanzania, yes we were that close. That day it was so hazy from the dust blowing around that is why the picture is so fuzzy.

The Sodium Plant

This pink water is part of the lake and there is an algae bloom going on in this section. There is a strange smell but we are not sure if it is the water or the plant emitting chemicals.




So we are on our way and at times there are no roads but just paths then we reach this water and we said this is the end of the road and Patrick our guide said oh no just hug the side of the hill. Reluctantly we did and hit a rock, I started praying as I wouldn't want to be sitting here too long as the temperature is about 90 degrees. So on we go and I am saying Patrick how much further and he said we are here, really? I am expecting bubbling springs but there were only one teeny one.

This was going back, that is water in front.

This was going to the Hot Springs

Get me out of here!

So Patrick says out of the car and go into the hot springs it is
medicinal and will cure your body. Well I got that far and was sure they were boiling me alive.

So I spotted some women sitting there and ask Henry what they were doing and he said selling jewelry. Well that is all I had to hear and I was out of the boiling water and doing something I know best.

Bargaining

 Forgot to tell you the lake is full of flamingos and because the lake is salt the only fish that can survive is Tilapia and they are very small. There must be something else because there are  so many, hundreds.

They are a very light pink but when they fly they are pinker underneath the wings. I said it was the salt or they fade out from the sun ?? Probably wrong on both counts.

Time to head back as it was getting late. So now we must get water and Patrick shows us where to go and even helps fill all the jugs. Nice kid.

I forgot to tell you that another one of our missions that day was to pass out ANU calendars. So we gave out several as we were filling up water, then we gave Patrick one and he said I want to go to college do you think there would be any scholarships for me. So we told him to contact the university and go meet with one of the staff. So it was time to say good bye to a very good and nice guy. I gave him a little extra pay.

That was his scarf, now I am Masai !

 

We head back to deliver our water and everyone said do you remember where the village was? None of us payed any attention as to where they were. So all the way back we are saying does this look like it ? Then all of a sudden we recognized it.

They ask us to pull us to there gate area so they could unload.
So at this point all the kids come running out to see the Mazoongoos . So they start unloading and I try to help.

How much does this weigh?

Not much, heh heh

Our driver Henry asked if we could come into there village and they were very reluctant, but after some talking and I got out the rest of the calendars and was mobbed by the kids also had some left over chips that they devoured and Henry said could you pay them 100 shillings to go into one of the huts which I did. The Masai are very closed people and are not much for outsiders but they were smiling by the time we left. Even the chief was smiling at me.
There was a younger married couple and more in today's world and  the only ones that spoke Swahili . Well Henry was trying to get through to them that we did not get the water just to get into there village but did it because we are Christians and wanted to do this for Jesus and them. Also he told them they should not charge someone
and should invite them into their homes as a friend . So hopefully we made some impact on them and maybe one of those children will end up at ANU and become a leader in his village. 

Inside the hut.

Notice all of them holding a calendar.

Married couple and our drivers.

It was a very long day but filled with such joy in meeting all of these wonderful people. I think we all felt that is was a good mission and the Lord was with us. As we started home it rained and in Africa that is a blessing.




Who knows maybe one of them could be the future president of Africa or America.









Kwahari  & La La Salama

Sharon