You got to go to Lamu man

"You got to go to Lamu man." I lost count how many time we heard that phrase while talking to fellow travellers. So when it came time to decide where to finish our trip it seemed we only had one real option: we had to go to Lamu.

So where is Lamu and why were we compelled to go there? Lamu is an island on Kenya's northern coast, close to the Somali border. This tropical paradise has a reputation for being very laid-back and has supposedly attracted a following of chronic pot smokers and those looking to escape the trappings of the modern world. In our experience we encounter few "drop-outs" and rather witnessed what can only be described as in invasion of rich Europeans who have built inappropriately large beachfront houses in this sleepy island hideaway. Luckily there were few of these folks about as the real tourist season was still a month away. Lamu's main town is the aptly named Lamu town and this where all the real action happens. The whole island has a very different feel than the rest of Kenya, due in no small part to the Arabic origins of the residents. There had to be more than 20 mosques in this little town and the narrow, donkey-filled alleys, white-washed architecture, and ancient dhow boats in the harbour gave us the impression we had step back in time to ancient Persia.

We spent one night in Lamu and then we felt the need to moved away from the "hustle and bustle" of the big city. On advice of some friends we move into the first floor of a beautiful villa situated halfway between Lamu town the beach loacted next to Shela town.

Unfortunately, our plans to have a nice relaxing beach vacation after so much hiking were slightly spoilt by a rather nasty bout of suspected food poisoning. To be completely honest, we really have no idea what was wrong with our digestive tracts but the end result was that Barry and I were "not right" for several days. As was typical of this trip, Barry recovered sooner and never got a ill as I had. I was forced to eat a diet of nothing but fruits for several days while he gorged himself on all the seafood he could consume. Not to fear thought, I more then made up for lost time when I finally felt better. There could not have been a crab, lobster, or prawn left on that island when we flew home.

Masai Mara

The Masai Mara. To sum it up in a word: Stunning! As big game parks go in Kenya, this is one of the smaller ones, but it is often described as the most spectacular and for good reason. The Masai Mara sits on the boarder with Tanzania and in essence constitutes the northern corner of Tanzania's Serengeti National Park. But this does not mean that it is just an add-on to its bigger brother south of the border. By all accounts the Masai Mara contains some of the most stunning scenery of all the big game parks, including the Serengeti. What makes this park so special are the rolling hills and diverse landscapes it possesses in such a small space. We quickly discovered how important it was to have nice scenery on these trips. Animal sightings are rare so often perusing the countryside is all you have to occupy your time while you search for the big game.

Barry and I were lucky enough to arrange a safari to the Masai Mara on very short notice after a problem occurred with the trip being arranged with my cousin Morgan. She had organized a trip with a tour operator, but because Barry and I were out of telephone range in the Cherangani hills at the critical moment in the negotiations, Morgan reluctantly cancelled the trip. In the end we found a company on 12 hours notice and felt that good luck must have been on our side. All that changed the next day when the van that was our transport arrived over 5 hours late due to no less than 4 different flat tires. This meant that we missed the first evening of our safari, a prized time to be viewing the animals that are particularly active at dusk. Our bad luck continued the next morning when we spent almost 2 hours trying to get into the park as the result of the driver having insufficient funds for the park fees :/

But all these problems seemed insignificant once we actually got into the park. Our guide and driver, Jimmy, was a man a few words but he definitely knew his business. On our two day trip he found lions, elephants, giraffes, zebras, gazelles, ostrich, hippos, jackals, tapi, gnu, and even a very elusive leopard. During one lion sighting we witnessed the water-buffalo that had been lunch and then found the two male lions only a short distance away with their faces covered in flies and blood as evidence of their hunting prowess. Not very pretty sight to see (or smell), but it is a reality of the life in the wild for these animals and I felt fortunate to have seen it first hand. On another occasion Jimmy found a collection of females and their cubs sleeping in a bush. How he spotted these lions is a mystery. Even staring right at the bush I could hardly see them, and I knew exactly where they were by this point. As I said, the man was good. The only animals that eluded us were rhinos and cheetahs, but I did not feel cheated in any way. Other highlights were when an elephant passed within a few metres of the van and the giraffe that could have almost climbed in the van, it was that close! I have a ton of photos that will be posted as soon as is possible. We are now back in Nairobi awaiting our next adventure on the coast.

Cherangani hills

The Cherangani hills were wonderful and I am so glad that our trip to Mt. Elgon was cancelled, allowing us to visit this hidden treasure of Kenya. Don't let the name fool you either. The Cherangani hills were not so much hills as they are mountains, soaring to heights of more than 3500 m. The views on offer here were nothing short of eye-popping, with jagged peaks, endless hills of rolling green, and quaint villages all in perfect measures. This was not some tourist trap that mzungu (a Swahili word for white people) invaded with their big 4x4's on weekends. This was the real Kenya, the one we had been searching for!

The people that made this little piece of paradise home only enhanced the experience. We have not met people so genuinely friendly and kind thus far on our trip. They were always happy to give us food or advice or point out shortcuts to the next village and they were equally happy to help us find the right trail again when we got hopelessly lost in the never ending maze of crop and livestock fields that these shortcuts always entailed. In return for their kindness we provided the locals with endless entertainment. They asked us countless questions about Canada, the world, and why two "rich" tourists would want to walk 15+ km a day through their isolated mountains. They sat and watched us from a distance as we bathed in the icy rivers or cooked meals on our little campstove. They followed us along the trails and laughed as we try to climb over cattle fences with our heavy bags. Not a fair trade really, but we had little else to offer them in our 25 kg packs.

Definite highlights included our visit to the Nike Marathon Training Camp in Kapsait to meet with the marathoners. These hills have long been a training ground for the world's best marathon runners, and it is easy to see why they would become world beaters in this environment. The mild climate (mid 20's), the altitude, and countless hills make it the perfect environment to train. The 4 hour drive out of the last valley, back to "civilization" in the back of a grain transport truck with about 50 of the local villagers also provided us with never a dull moment.

But before you go thinking that this was just a walk in the park I should warn you that this was a grueling 4 days of walking. We averaged 15 km a day over hilly terrain and numerous obstacles and the descent to the last village was the steepest hiking I have ever done. Two vertical kilometres needed to be negotiated in stifling 35+ C heat! My efforts were not aided by the nasty blisters that had been forming for days on my heels (remember those "great fitting" replacement boots I bought in Kitale?) and the sprained ankle I received midway down the mountain while climbing a cattle fence. But despite all this, our adventure here was one of the best parts of the trip so far. I hope the safari with my cousin Morgan will be half as good.

Mt. going, going...Elgon

After leaving Kisumu, Barry and I caught a matatu to the town of Kitale, which would serve as the base for our ascent of Mt. Elgon, a 4300 metre peak located on the Ugandan boarder. Unfortunately the residents of Kitale and the park rangers at Mt. Elgon did not seem to share our vision. Kitale was a rough and tumble town that had a real old west, frontier sort of feeling about it. I was only in town 2 minutes when someone had stolen the hiking shoes off my back, not an ideal start to a 5 day death march in the high alpine. The machine gun-toting guards at each store did nothing to alter our impressions of this town.

Once the disappointment of losing my shoes had passed we set out to find me new footwear. Our efforts to find my recently "liberated" shoes for sale in the local market were a failure, but we did find a shop selling piles of pre-owned shoes from Canada. Twenty minutes of digging through the various mounds resulted in my purchasing a pair of half decent leather hiking boots that seemed to fit me well.


With my new shoes in hand we set off for the park gates at Mt. Elgon, but not before engaging in an animated round of negotiations with the local taxi drivers over the fare. We arrived at the gates bright and early with our 25 kg packs in tow only to be told by the ranger that we were not permitted to climb his mountain. Barry used his best interrogation skills to extract the reasoning behind this unfortunate turn of events. Alas all we could extract from the man was some vague excuse about security. However, he did kindly inform us that we were more than welcome to use a 4x4 to reach the top. No reasons were offered as to why this was a more acceptable option. In the end we managed to convince him to let us camp at the nearest campsite and visit the Kitum cave. This cave is world famous for the frequent visits by elephants who mine salt from the walls to supplement their diets. Unfortunately we did not see any elephants here, but we were visited by a curious troop of baboons. Between protecting our food and camping gear from our new visitors and worrying about a potential elephant stampede/leopard attack in the middle of the night we came up with an alternate plan for the next few days. The verdict: The Cherangani hills.