An Africa odyssey

[JohnM]

Egyptian goose.



African jacana (aka ‘Jesus bird’ because it often appears to be walking on water.) Jacanas are also common in northern Australian wetlands.



Black-winged stilts, black crake.



Glossy ibis, grey heron.



Yellow-billed stork and grey heron.



Greater flamingos.



Squacco heron, hamerkop.

 

[JohnM]

Bohor reedbuck, little egret.



Yellow-billed stork and African spoonbill, great white pelicans and Egyptian goose.



Thomson’s gazelle.



Pied avocet.



We stopped at the Amboseli airstrip to partake of our packed picnic lunch.



Needs an orthodontist.



African fish eagle.



Back to the entry and the resident (single-tusked) elephant was putting on a performance drinking from the tap.



Excellent day.

 

[JohnM]

Out of the park and on our way back to our lodge, via a Maasai village visit ‘experience’. I guess it needs to be done, especially for first-timers, but it’s a tourist trap for trinket-selling.



Making fire. Friction first ignites some dry powdered cattle dung.



Then the trinket-selling began in earnest. A masterful divide and conquer strategy as the men split us into couples then guided us separately in different directions along two rows of pleading-eyed women sitting behind their offerings. Anything that you showed any interest in was immediately picked up by the ‘guide’ and then the handful was subject to negotiation from an outrageously high asking price and pleadings of starvation and apocalypse at every counteroffer. Those guys were masters of their craft.

 

[JohnM]

Back to the lodge. After a bit of chill time in our tent, we walk outside and bam! This view hits us in the face. The cloud had suddenly cleared. Quite incredible after being so thick all day, and perfect timing for our imminent sundowner in the bush.



While waiting to go for the sundowner, there was a good example of whistling thorn Acacia bulbs and bodyguard ants in the lodge grounds. These hollow bulbs are called domatia and serve as a secure home for aggressive Crematogaster ants, while the tree feeds them with sugar-rich secretions.

Elephants have a deep aversion to the ants. If an elephant tries to feed on the branches, thousands of ants will instantly swarm its trunk, a highly sensitive organ packed with nerves, and bite the delicate inner lining of its nostrils.



Kili is a dormant volcano. There are three volcanic cones on the mountain, Shira, Kibo and Mawenzi. The summit, on the Kibo cone, is called Uhuru Peak.

 

[JohnM]

Next day and it was back to the airstrip for the flight to the Masai Mara. (The difference between ‘Masai Mara’ and ‘Maasai Mara’ comes down to spelling preferences between the Anglicized/colonial spelling (‘Masai’) and the correct spelling in the indigenous Maa language (‘Maasai’). Masai is the traditional colonial or Anglicized spelling used by British administrators, early travellers, and many modern tourism brands. Both names refer to the same region and protected wildlife reserve in southwestern Kenya.)

In the garden of the lodge before we left.

Marico sunbird.



Scarlet-chested sunbird.



Cute little Emily, the tame bushbuck at the lodge.



Young giraffe spotted on the way to the airstrip.



Ahh, just what I was hoping to see! The company’s newer Cessna 208B Grand Caravan EX in place of the previous standard bird that had hauled us in. About 30% more power, seats 10, with 8 in Oasis orbital-platform recliner seats. Four-blade prop instead of three.



This’ll do…



Does this bird go!

The flight was about 1.5 hours, with plenty of sightseeing deviations. First some low sweeping passes over Amboseli, then sneaking over the northern end of Lake Natron in Tanzania, up and over into the Rift Valley and up and out again before coming into Ol Kiombo airstrip, in the central Masai Mara. It’s one of 11 airstrips in the Masai Mara and surrounding conservancies.

 

[JohnM]

Diversity of habitats in Amboseli.

 

[JohnM]

Then hauling up and away westwards.



Garmin G1000 NXi next-gen avionics.



Up and over the eastern Rift Valley wall.

 

[JohnM]

And Lake Natron comes into view.

Lake Natron is a closed-system mineral-rich hyper-alkaline soda lake in the East African Rift System, known for a high abundance of lesser flamingos. It’s the breeding ground for 75% of the world’s lesser flamingos.

 

[JohnM]

And up we go again over the west wall of the Rift Valley.



And then the plains of the Masai Mara came into view.



Mara River and wildebeest herds.

 

[JohnM]

Into Ol Kiombo. It was constantly very busy.

Our lodge was only a few hundred metres away. We arrived late morning and were there three nights.

The first game drive followed later in the afternoon.