[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

[Kenya] Samburu

The first game reserve we visited in Kenya was Samburu. It is located about 7 hours  north of Nairobi.

Female Somali ostrich in Samburu

I thought I didn't know anything about Samburu up until we got there. When we entered the main gate of the Samburu National Reserve (which is painted to resemble the spots of a reticulated giraffe)...

Entrance to the Samburu National Reserve

...there was a small sign commemorating Elsa, an orphaned lioness who was raised by George and Joy Adamson before eventually being released back into the wild. I read about Elsa when I was a kid. This lioness gained a lot of popularity because the movie "Born Free" was made about her story and the song "Born Free" by Matt Monro was actually written for the film. Samburu is one of two places where Elsa was raised and the small memorial at the entrance indicates how Elsa helped safeguard this game reserve, probably because her popularity helped Samburu gain more financial support. I took a photo of this memorial before realizing that there was another sign next to it that talked about Kamunyak, a lioness who became famous for adopting a baby oryx. (One of the staff members of the Samburu Sopa Lodge where we stayed told of us this story and said there was a sign at the Samburu gate about it and that's when I realized I had a photo of it.)

Memorial for Elsa and Kamunyak at the Samburu entrance

Arguably the most beautiful and elegant animal we saw during our safari was the reticulated giraffe. We saw so many of them during our Samburu game drives. Apparently, there are several different giraffe subspecies, and it was only in Samburu that we saw this particular one.

Reticulated giraffe

We also saw several other animals here that we didn't see elsewhere such as the rare and endangered Grevy's zebra, which is the largest wild equid and can be distinguished from the plains zebra by its tigher stripes...

Grevy's zebra

...and the rare and near-threatened striped hyena. I continue to be amazed at how our guide Zachary saw it. The sun had set, it was dark and we were on our way back to the Lodge. As we were driving along the dirt path, Zachary stopped, looked behind the jeep, and pointed to the hyena behind some bushes and quite some distance away from us. Considering how dark it was and how even when he was pointing it out to us, it was still tough to see, it blows my mind that Zachary actually spotted it while driving! I'm really happy that the striped hyena walked a bit closer to us and crossed the dirt road because it gave us a chance to take a better photo.

Striped hyena

A few more animals that we also got to see only in Samburu were the gerenuk, or giraffe gazelle, which is called as such because of its long and slender neck,

Gerenuk or giraffe gazelle

the Beisa oryx which is known for having beautifully long and straight horns,

Beisa oryxes

the dik-dik, which is one of the smallest antelopes in Africa (I previously thought it was the smallest but apparently, it isn't; the royal antelope is),

Dik-diks

and the superb starling with its beautiful plumage. (That said, I can't be sure if we also saw it elsewhere but it's only in Samburu that we got to recognize it, see it upclose, and take a photo of it.)

Superb starling

Of course, we also saw many other animals here, including ostriches,

Male Somali ostrich

impalas,

Impalas

Thomson's gazelles

Thomson's gazelles

a black-backed jackal,

black-backed jackal

warthogs,

warthogs

and baboons. (Now that I think of it, I'm not sure if we actually saw baboons in the other game reserves so we might have seen them only in Samburu. And boy were there a lot of them!)

Baboon

What I also really love about Samburu is its landscape. There are lots of trees and vegetation set against mountains and hills.

Samburu landscape

We also got to see the Ewaso Ng'iro river.

Ewaso Ng'iro river

We spent a day and a half (and two nights) in Samburu before departing for Lake Nakuru. On our second night, Zachary told us that there was a threat of roads being blocked the next day due to a nationwide protest and he recommended that we leave very early. Samburu Sopa Lodge prepared packed breakfast for us and we left at around 6am. Before we left the reserve, we got to see a beautiful sunrise.

Sunrise in Samburu

I'm not sure if I know anyone who has been to Samburu but I'm glad we got to go on safari here because it was absolutely magnificent.

Next: Lake Nakuru

[Kenya] The Big Five

The term "Big Five" actually doesn't have the best roots. It was coined by hunters to collectively refer to the five animals in Africa that were supposedly the most difficult to hunt on foot. Thankfully, it is now used by safari tour operators to refer to a set of animals that they would like to people to see during game drives. The Big Five: elephant, lion, rhino, buffalo, and leopard.

The Big Five: Elephant, Lion, Rhino, Buffalo, and Leopard

The first of the big five animals we saw was the African elephant. On our very first game drive in Samburu, our guide/driver heard on the radio that there was an elephant sighting. We made our way to where they supposedly were and while the herd of elephants was on the move, we got there in time to see them and take several photos!

African Elephant

The second animal we saw is one of the more difficult ones to see: the rhino. Actually, the rhino was the only animal we didn't get to see in a game reserve. Apparently, rhinos don't particularly like the noise generated by wildebeests during the Great Wildebeest Migration which means rhino sightings in Maasai Mara are quite rare during this time. Our guide knew that we might not actually get to see them in Maasai Mara so on our way from Samburu to Lake Nakuru, he decided to pass by Solio Ranch, which is a sanctuary for rhinos. We got to see several of them as we passed by. Thankfully for us, there weren't a lot of cars on the road so we were able to stop on the side of a road briefly but long enough to take a few photos.

White Rhinoceros

The next big five member we saw was the African cape buffalo. We saw this creature for the first time in Lake Nakuru, then we get to see it again in Maasai Mara.

African Cape Buffalo

Before we left Lake Nakuru, we got to see some lions! Initially, dozens of jeeps were parked around the area of this lion sighting in Lake Nakuru and we couldn't get in. We decided to leave that area and look for other animals. However, on our way out of Lake Nakuru National Park, we passed by that same area again and most of the jeeps were leaving. We managed to get in a good position to see the lions better and to take several photos of them.

Lion

The last of the big five we saw is also known to be the most difficult to see: the leopard. By nature, leopards are solitary, nocturnal, and they rest in trees making it very difficult to spot them (pun intended). It was on our 5th day and our final game drive in Maasai Mara that we finally got to see one! Our guide Zachary got word of a leopard sighting and drove there. When we arrived, there were several other jeeps parked in the area. The telltale sign that there was a leopard in the area was a dead and bloody wildebeest hanging from a tree branch. Since the leopard was pretty much the only animal we still wanted to see but hadn't seen yet at that point, we decided to wait it out. After an hour, we finally caught glimpses of it just as it was leaving the tree where it hung its kill. Our guide told us that the leopard was most likely going to poop somewhere else and it would be heading back after several minutes. He said we should stay, even as most of the other jeeps had already left, and I'm thankful we did because the leopard did actually come back and we finally got to see it and take decent photos of it. It was beautiful!

Leopard

Deciding to go on safari for 6 days and 5 nights turned out to be a really good choice for us because it allowed us to see all the Big Five animals.

Next post: Samburu