Southern Coast Beach Holiday

Happy Holidays from Kris, Ken, and Claire in Kenya! We spent Christmas on the southern coast and will be in Kasigau by New Years Eve, with a few days in Nairobi in the interim.

We've returned to Nairobi from a visit to the Southern Coast of Kenya, touring different places from south of the port city Mombasa to theTanzanian border.

We began this trip with an all-day drive from Nairobi to beautiful Tiwi Beach, where the five of us (Ken, Claire, David, John, and myself) shared a lovely banda above the Indian Ocean.

The banda was a treat for us all because we shopped in markets along the way and cooked for ourselves, washed laundry, and generally lived a relaxing few days on the beach with only day trips out into the tourist world.

One of the high points here was the twice daily troop of monkeys coming through, entertaining us with their antics (which included concerted and successful efforts to steal food). I estimated 30+ monkeys cruising around the grounds, mothers with babies clutching upside down on their stomachs, fathers leading and watching over the troop, and youngsters who were the most

aggressive on stealing food. The monkeys look and act so much like people that is impossible to watch them without making up stories about their lives.

The beach itself has very unusual undercut rock formations from the wave action, and fisherman who come by selling the daily catch. It made for a beautiful and every-changing environment and we spent much of our time exploring and combing the beach. My sister Gail would have loved it!

We visited Kongo Mosque, the oldest mosque in Africa, constructed of coral and right on the beach. The mosque beach is close to Diani Beach, the largest package tour beach in Kenya, but at the same time quite isolated, quiet, and free from commercial influences of large hotels and resorts. We were there on Christmas Eve and again in the evening of Christmas Day, with a large number of Christian Kenyans who appreciated the quiet ambience.

The coastal province here is predominantly Muslim, but also the prime holiday travel destination for the majority Christian population from "upcountry" in Kenya, which made for a very intriguing holiday away from home.

Mombasa City is an island, requiring a ferry ride to get from the beaches to the sights in town. Usually the crossing is quick, but for some reason there was a two hour wait the day our group chose to go. Hot and sweaty tourists!

Mombasa is the heartland of Swahili culture and has an interesting and convoluted history, alternately ruled and influenced by Portugal, Arabs, and a number of different east African tribes. Foods especially fruit and fish and nuts, are plentiful, music is everywhere, people are diverse and happy, and in general the atmosphere of Mombasa at the holidays is one big relaxed party.

Photos here of Fort Jesus and the old town show the architecture and the lay of the land around and within the fort.

We spent Christmas Day on the water, taking a snorkeling trip to a marine reserve.

The fish were plentiful, beautiful, and interesting and made me wish I had an underwater camera and the know-how to use it.

We rode in a dhow boat (ours had a motor for faster transport) with a diverse group of about 25 people and had lunch on Wasini Island, fish of course. Yummy.

On Wasini Island also there is a "coral garden" with a boardwalk through coral rock and mangrove forest. The site is covered in sea water at high tide each month.

It is impressive how similar tropical fishing life is to fishing lifestyles in the Pacific Northwest and SE Alaska, and also how different.

Next we will be in Nairobi for a few days and then on to Kasigau at last.

We are all ready for our homecoming in Bungule and respite from the weariness of being tourists in Kenya.

Bye for now

Kris

Road Trip along Rift Valley!

We left Nairobi with David and John in a Toyota Noah for a trip north into the Rift Valley, a massive rift in the earth that spans from the Red Sea to Mozambique. Our first stop was Lake Naivasha, where to our surprise the lake had risen considerably from all the welcome recent rain, and the previous shoreline had disappeared into the water! We would have needed a boat to arrive at the old view point.

This turned out to be lucky for us because the view point we did find was home to a huge flock of flamingos, providing for engaging observations and many photo ops. Flamingos are much more active, beautiful, interesting and fun to watch than I ever imagined. Great first day on our road trip.

There are a number of private game preserves in the area of Lake Naivasha and it was strangely wonderful to see monkeys in the trees, and zebras, buffalo,

giraffe, and wart hogs grazing on the green grass close to the road while driving between villages.Naivasha is a magical place where you can see Kenyan game animals usually only viewed in national parks, but also a place where the local people are very poor and almost all work in giant cut flower farms owned by foreigners, mainly Europeans & Scandinavians.

There seems often to be a dark underside to the major attractions in Kenya that is at once the most uncomfortable and most intriguing aspect of the country.

Our friend and guide David is very politically minded, and a great source of information on all things Kenyan. We are fortunate to be privy to a wealth of political, social, cultural, and economic information and commentary during our time with him that would otherwise be unavailable to tourists. David has also provided us opportunities to visit places not usually on the itinerary for tourists from outside Kenya, like the equator and Thompson Falls. At the equator we were schooled with a demonstration of the effects on the movement of water of when crossing from south to north.

Next stop Nakuru, the lovely fourth largest city in Kenya with a wonderful game park surrounding Lake Nakuru. Here, too, the lake was unusually high and the track that usually runs right along the shore was underwater. Nonetheless,on our evening game drive we saw incredible birds and animals large and small. After being at Lake Naivasha it is easy to pictures the animals that now

only mainly inhabit the national parks roaming freely throughout the country.

From Nakuru we drove north to Lakes Bogoria and Lake Baringia, including a hike along the former and a boat ride on the latter. We stayed at a lakeside camp where we would very much like to return, waking to a myriad of bird calls and going to sleep after chasing away a hippo munching on grass outside the tent.

The lakes in the Rift Valley tend to be

very alkaline because the valley formation is volcanic in origin. We saw hippos inBaringia, a first for me in the wild, but at a distance and while moving because the boat motor irritates/scares them, and hippos can be dangerous when scared. We also saw a crocodile and a snake and fed fish to fish eagles, which resemble bald eagles in size and behavior.

The observant among you will notice that the photos I've posted do not include hippos, crocodiles, or fish eagles. Ken is a much better wildlife photographer than I am, so maybe he can add some at a later time.

We have been back in Nairobi since yesterday afternoon and are leaving early tomorrow for another road trip to Mombasa on the coast, and the heart of Swahili culture and history in Kenya. Claire arrived today and is sleeping off her two day travel. Having her here is making me wish Dustin was also along for the trip.

Thanks to those of you who are reading, and also for the comments.

Kris

A Couple Days in Nairobi

We were met at the airport by our very dear friends David Houston Shihemi and John Mwambuso Kapombe (left to right in the photo), and came directly to our hotel in downtown Nairobi. We like the places David selects for us because they are frequented by Kenyans, other Africans, and "mzungu", other Caucasian travelers like ourselves. The food is African and British and the buildings are open-air, and our hearts are at home here.

Yesterday we took a trip out of town to a place called Paradise Lost where the MauMau people lived for 10 years in caves behind a waterfall during their rebellion against the British.

The place surrounding is now a Kenyan-owned coffee plantation that we toured as well. The environment is an unsettling mix of the spirits of dark, brutal colonial history and pleasant bucolic setting. And then there is the modern world encroaching on the long past. It was all very interesting, and reminded Ken and I of all the time we spent with my sister Gail in Alaska when she was roasting her own coffee. The time change was still weighing us down, and we were so tired that the fresh roasted, ground, and brewed coffee at the plantation was a welcome, if short-lived, jolt of energy.

Mwambuso is our constant companion and has grown into a very mature and serious (but funny) young man. We met David's wife Nancy for dinner and then were stuck in a 2 hour traffic jam driving back into the city. Today we are leaving for a few days in the Rift Valley, and quite anxious to leave the hustle and bustle of the city.

P.S.

My father corrected my spelling of the airport in Amsterdam - Schipol with a C! Thanks, Dad...always the teacher.

Return to Kasigau 2012

We are on our way to Kenya once again, posting now from Schiphol Airport in Amsterdam on the way. Ken and I will travel for a couple weeks before the students arrive to the Rift Valley with a friend who is a tour operator. We are not posting any photos today because as my mother said 14 hours ago when we FaceTimed from Seattle, we look exhausted and only want to post vibrant pictures of ourselves and others. I'm just making a test run on the blog.

Google "Return to Kasigau" if you can't get here from the url I send on the email.

Kris