[Kenya] Lake Naivasha and Crescent Island

We visited Lake Naivasha and Crescent Island on the 6th and last day of our safari adventure. Similar to our Maasai Village Tour, this was an optional add-on to our itinerary. It includes a boat safari and a nature walk with animals so I thought it would be a wonderful experience for me and my family. And indeed, it was!

Lake Naivasha

Our boat safari started at around 2:15pm. Here we saw several hippos that were mostly submerged apart from the very tops of their heads. It was very exhilarating being very close to them but also quite scary because our boat was very small and an angry hippo could easily flip it over. I know that many people are attacked by hippos every year and I shared this concern with our guide but he said we shouldn't worry. To paraphrase what he said, when you send out positive and peaceful energy to the hippos, they will send you that same energy back.

Seeing hippos almost at eye level in Lake Naivasha

We also got pretty close to a couple of pelicans.

Pelicans

We also saw a couple of fish eagles. Our guide said it was a male and a female and that  the female is larger. Our guides tried to get one of the eagles to swoop down from its lofty perch and fly closeer to us on the surface of the lake by tossing some fish he had with him into the water. However, it seems that the eagles might have just eaten and were still full because none of them were attracted to the fish the guides were offering.

One of two fish eagles we saw (the other was perched on another tree)

Our guide also told us that there were a lot of dead tree trunks jutting out of the lake because the water level here has risen several meters over the years.

Many dead tree trunks jutting out of the lake

After being on our boat for about 45 minutes, we docked at Crescent Island for our nature walk with animals.

Crescent Island

Here we were joined by a different guide (her name was Susan). She told us that the reason there are a lot of large herbivores in Crescent Island is because of the 1985 film Out of Africa, which starred Meryl Streep and Robert Redford. This film shot some of its sequences here and the film crew brought many animals here to make it look more like the bush. Once filming ended, the animals were left here where they (or their descendants) continue to live and thrive. Since there are no predators here, going on a nature walk amidst the animals has become a pretty popular tourist activity. (Side note: our guide asked us where we were from and when we told her we were from the Philippines, she happily told us that she actually watches some Filipino drama shows. Cool!)

We did a nature walk with wild animals on Crescent Island

The first animal we got to see here and have a photo taken with is the masai giraffe.

Masai giraffe

We also got to see zebras,

Plains zebras

waterbucks,

Waterbucks

impalas,

Impalas

wildebeests,

Wildebeest

and gazelles.

Gazelles

We spent about an hour walking around the island and Susan very kindly took our photos with the animals. As we were heading back to the dock, it started to rain. We got somewhat soaked while on the boat but on our way back, we got to see the not-so-common sight of hippos out of the water!

Hippos on land

It was an amazing experience and a very relaxing way to end our tour, despite the rain. I'm also happy that we started our boat safari when we did. Our guide Zachary actually wanted us to start a bit later in the day - at around 3pm - because he thought it might be too hot for us to start at around 2pm. But we felt it would be good to start earlier, heat notwithstanding, to optimize our time in Kenya especially because we were all tired. If we started an hour later as Zachary initially suggested, we would end up having gotten badly drenched by the rain while doing our nature walk. That was a close call!

Boat safari in Lake Naivasha

I'm really happy that we added this option to our tour. It cost US$50 per person for both the boat safari in Lake Naivasha and the nature walk in Crescent Island, but given the richness of our experience, it was absolutely worth it.

Nature walk in Crescent Island

Next post: The Giraffes of Kenya

[Kenya] Maasai Village Cultural Experience

Our tour package gave us an option to include a Maasai Village Cultural Tour to our itinerary. This Maasai community visit would allow us to interact with the Maasai people and learn about their way of life. I thought this would be a great experience for us to have so I included it in our package. We got to do this after we got settled in Mara Empiris Safari Camp, our accommodations in Maasai Mara.

Visiting a Maasai village

It started with what probably was the highlight of our visit - a Maasai dance of the welcome us to their village. They were also chanting in harmony as they danced. It was amazing to see and hear in person!

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As if that wasn't enough, midway through the dance, all of the men in our group were invited to join them. We even got to participate in Adumu, the famous jumping dance. My bad knees, made worse by an exhausting trip, meant that I could barely get any decent lift off the ground, but I still did it. (Our guide told us that the jumping dance is a competition and whoever jumps highest normally gets to pay a lower dowry; I've heard and read about Adumu indicates that the winner of this jumping competition gets to marry the woman. Either way, it is an important Maasai custom.)

Getting ready to join the Maasai jumping dance

We were then showed how they Maasai people make fire...

The Maasai villagers demonstrated how they make fire

...before being invited to try and make fire ourselves. My brother and my nephew tried it.

My brother trying to make fire

We were then invited to enter their houses. The houses are made mostly of cow dung, which we were told is pretty water-proof.

Inside the house of Tommy, our guide (I believe he is also the son of the chief)

Once we stepped out of these houses, we were then regaled by another Maasai dance, performed by the women. This time, the women in our group were invited to join them and they did.

Dance of the Maasai women

Afterwards, we visited the Maasai Village Market. We bought several souvenirs here.

Maasai village market

The Maasai Village wasn't too far from our hotel - the Mara Empiris Safari Camp - so we actually walked most of the way back home as our guide Tom talked more about their life here.

Walking back to our hotel from the Maasai village

It was such a culturally-enriching experience. It was great to understand the Maasai people a little better and to have a tiny bit of an immersion into their lives. I absolutely loved seeing their traditional dances and even getting to participate! I'm very happy that I added this optional activity to our itinerary.

My family with the Maasai community

Next: Lake Naivasha and Crescent Island

[Kenya] Maasai Mara

We spent our entire fifth day on safari in Maasai Mara and it was a day filled with incredible highlights and memories.

Maasai Mara

We entered the gate just before 8 AM. It took several minutes for our guide Zachary to sort out our entry into Maasai Mara National Reserve since there were a lot of people going in.

Entrance to Maasai Mara National Reserve

Late July to October is a very popular time to visit Maasai Mara because this is when the Great Wildebeest Migration happens. (That, and July and August are the summer months in the Western world and many Westerners often travel during this time.)

Wildebeests

Naturally, there were thousands of wildebeests there. It was the first time we saw them too because we didn't see these creatures (which are also called gnu) up until we got to Maasai Mara.

We were in Maasai Mara during the Great Wildebeest Migration

By our fifth day on safari, we had already seen many animals in Samburu and Lake Nakuru so our goal was to try and see animals that we hadn't seen yet. When we heard there was a cheetah hidden in the savanna, we waited to catch a glimpse. Our guide said it was eating its kill which is why it was hidden in the tall grass. Eventually, after maybe 15 minutes or more, it reared its head for all of us to see. It was not very close to us so the photos I managed to take were unfocused and grainy but at least we got to see it and capture it on camera.

Cheetah

I also previously wrote about waiting more than an hour to see a leopard with its kill up a tree.

A leopard with its kill up a tree

There were a few more animals we saw here that we didn't see in our previous game drives, such as spotted hyenas,

Spotted hyena

topis, which are antelopes that have bluish black patches on their legs,

Topis

the lilac-breasted roller, which is Kenya's national bird (when it is in flight and its wings are spread, you can see its full array of vibrant colors and it is visually stunning),

Lilac-breasted roller

elands, which are the world's largest antelopes,

Elands

and the masai giraffe.

Masai giraffe

Maasai Mara is quite vast so our hotel provided us with packed lunch which we ate inside the game reserve, picnic-style. Our guide had picnic blankets and we enjoyed our food underneath a solitary tree in the savanna. It's amazing to think that we were eating in the midst of wild animals but this seems to be a common activity here and our tour operator wouldn't have allowed us to do this if it wasn't safe. I'm guessing  that predators don't normally attack human beings in the bush, especially not during the Great Wildebeest migration when they have a lot of prey and as such, are all pretty well-fed.

Photo op after our picnic lunch under this tree in Maasai Mara

Another highlight: visiting the border of Kenya and Tanzania, which also happened to be the border of Maasai Mara and Serengeti. We were lucky because when we arrived, we were the only people there. We got to take a lot of solo pics as well as group photos before other tourists arrived and fell in line behind us for their turn at a photo op with the border marker.

Border of Kenya and Tanzania

Later that afternoon, we visited the Mara River.

Mara river

I was hoping that we would get to see the famed wildebeest river crossing but it didn't happen while we were there. Nevertheless, we still got to see lots of hippos...

Hippos

and some Nile crocodiles.

Nile crocodile

We then headed over to a ranger station in the Mara Triangle. Here, a park ranger - with a rifle in hand - took us on a 30-minute walk along the banks of the Mara River.

Mara Triangle ranger station

One of the most interesting things we got to see was what seemed to be a territorial dispute between two very aggressive hippos.

Dispute between two hippos

We started to making our way out of Maasai Mara at around 530pm after spending the whole day here. Before we left, I took a few photos of the beautiful sunset.

Maasai Mara sunset

We got to see many more animals here but this blog post is long enough as it is haha. It was quite enriching that we got to go on safari in three different game reserves that had different landscapes. If Samburu has mountains and hills and Lake Nakuru has a lake, Maasai Mara has its seemingly endless savanna.

The vast savannas of Maasai Mara

Next: Maasai Village Tour Experience

[Kenya] Lake Nakuru

The next stop on our multi-game reserve Kenyan safari was Lake Nakuru.

Entrance to Lake Nakuru National Park

Our guide Zachary told us that Nakuru is the fourth biggest city in Kenya. What amazed me is that Lake Nakuru is a game reserve located within city limits. How awesome is that? As I was marveling at this piece of information, Zachary told us that Nairobi is the only capital city in the world that has a national park. Wow!

Lake Nakuru

It is here where we got to see plains zebras for the first time. It is interesting to note - and Zachary told us about this as well - that zebras don't seem to fear humans. (Antelopes tend to be skittish and move away when humans get close to them but zebras don't, making it easy to take photos of them.)

Plains zebras

It is also here where we got to see the African cape buffalo, one of the Big Five, for the first time.

African cape buffalo

While we only spent a couple of hours in Lake Nakuru, we did get to see a few animals here that we didn't get to see elsewhere, such as the hadada ibis (it has beautiful iridescent feathers which you can't see very well in this photo),

Hadada ibis

the colobus monkey (once again, I have no idea how Zachary spotted this colobos monkey high up in the branches while driving),

Colobus monkey

and the Rothschild's giraffe, another giraffe subspecies.

Rothschild's giraffe

It is in Lake Nakuru where we got to see lions for the first time. It seemed like there was one female (though I can't be sure if it was female or just a very young male with no hint of a mane yet) and two young males several meters behind her. It was exciting!

Lions

We also got to see what looked like a crested eagle eating its prey. Zachary somehow spotted this eagle perched on this tree and as I took its photo, it started to eat what looked like a rodent that it had in its talon. Great timing!

An eagle with prey in its talons

We also saw a fish eagle in its aerie.

Fish eagle

I was hoping that we would see flamingos in the lake area. Unfortunately, there weren't any when we got there but we did get to see lots of other birds around the lake, including the sacred ibis,

Sacred ibis

marabou storks,

Marabou stork

and lots of pelicans.

Pelicans

It took us about 7 hours to get from Samburu to Lake Nakuru (although we did have about a 45 minute stop for breakfast along the way), which was quite tiring. Thankfully, it was in this drive that we got to pass by Solio Ranch to see several white rinos.

White rhinos in Solio ranch

After seeing the mountains and hills of Samburu, it was great to see the majestic Lake Nakuru.

Next post: Maasai Mara