Thursday, 29th July 2004
No game drive in the morning, as we moved on from the Masai Mara. Much of the day was spent bumping along to our next destination: Lake Nakuru, one of the Rift Valley soda lakes. The area along the edge of the Rift Valley is quite developed, so we passed through a number of quite large towns (including one where we nearly ran over Henry’s sister!). There is also a reasonable amount of industry, built up to take advantage of the minerals in the lakes, so the beautiful vistas of the Mara were soon left behind.
We arrived at our lodge, Lion Hill Lodge, by early afternoon and had some lunch. We then transferred to the poolside and lazed in the sun for a while, before 20 brisk lengths (and a cooling Tusker or two).
We are only here for one night, so our afternoon game drive was our only opportunity to see the local wildlife. As with our first evening drive at the Masai Mara, the weather started to take a turn as we set out, and dark storm clouds moved in. The area is heavily wooded, unlike the Mara, so there are only a few tracks to follow; initially all we spotted were a few monkeys, and, through the trees, waterbuck by the lakeside. However, we finally came out on the lake shore ourselves, to be confronted by a stinking, squawking mass of pink. Although I have seen pictures, nothing prepares you for the reality: enormous groups of bright pink flamingos, orange-white pelicans and purple-black ibis; the continual din of squawking and splashing; the reek of ammonia from the guano.
We got out of the van and watched the action for a while, although Henry was obviously keen to move on, as the sky darkened and the temperature dropped. (although the dark sky certainly made an impressive backdrop to the bright pink flamingos). We trundled slowly along the beach, narrowly avoiding a face-to-face fracas with a buffalo, and rejoined the main track which took us all the way around the lake.
At the far end of the lake, our hectic pace slowed, and Henry sniffed the air, asking “Can you smell them?”.... “I smell rhino!” he added. And around the next bend, there they were! What a tracker! Or maybe not....according to our guidebook, white rhinos were hunted to extinction in Kenya some time ago, but were reintroduced in carefully protected areas quite recently. So in a way, it was a little like seeing rhinos in a zoo, as they had been brought here and released, although they are still wild animals. The zoo/farm atmosphere was intensified by the huge number of tour groups there, and also by the fact that, bizarrely, the grazing rhinos looked a lot like very large, horned cows. Pretty cool, though!
Lake Nakuru is also supposedly a good place to spot leopard, our one remaining “big five” tick, but after the rhino, the storm clouds finally arrived bringing torrential rain, so we hurried back to camp.
In the evening, there was a performance by a local song and dance group, but we missed most of it. The usual buffet dinner was again very good, with the barbeque being especially tasty, washed down with some reasonable South African plonk.
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