Stacey is up for this rare intimacy. But Daisy doesn’t kiss
on the first date. She prefers to daintily lick pellets from your fingers while
Betsy likes a cuddle. You stand facing away from her and cup the pellets down
low so she reaches her huge head over your shoulder and lets you pat her
beautiful face and look into those seductive brown eyes
framed by thick black lashes. I love giraffes and have admired them from a
distance so I am squealing with delight to get up close and personal with these
magnificent animals of grand design.
This is the first hour of our Absolute Africa safari. What a
thrilling start! We kicked off at the Giraffe
Centre in Nairobi, Kenya, us five solo travellers, perched high in the
biggest 28-seater bright yellow bus you’ve ever seen, with this travelling
lounge room all to ourselves. Our jovial tour leader Edmund and skilful driver
Stephen are riding in the cabin.
We met early at the tranquil Wildebeest Eco Camp and introduced
ourselves: Merethe, 35, a research assistant from Trondheim, Norway, Julio, 36,
a marketing whiz from Mexico City, Amy, 36, an adventurous nurse from Denver,
Colorado, Marissa, who just celebrated her 30th birthday while volunteering
in the Kibera Slums,
a well-travelled nurse from Vancouver, Canada. And me, imagining I am younger than I am, an Aussie writer living in the UK.
Our second attraction is so heart-warming I almost burst
with joy! At the Sheldrick
Elephant Orphanage, we saw over a dozen adorable rusty-skinned baby
elephants trot merrily into an enclosure for their morning feed of special
formula milk, given to each eager baby in a huge plastic bottle by a smiling keeper in green overalls.
I watch as visitors from around the world, in hushed awe,
click their smart phone cameras and zoom lens Canons, trying to capture this
enthralling spectacle to take home some of the magic.
When the hungry youngsters have had their fill, and cameras
are exhausted, our guide takes the microphone and explains how these precious
babies came to be orphans; how their courageous, protective mothers didn’t
stand a chance against poachers’ guns, leaving their young alone and starving
wandering helplessly until rescued and transported to the orphanage where the
babies spent eight years in care before being carefully released into the wild.
This dedicated elephant orphanage in Nairobi was founded by
Dr Dame Daphne Sheldrick in 1977 in honour of her late husband, acclaimed naturalist,
David Sheldrick, MBE who worked for over 20 years as a park warden with the Royal National Parks of Kenya, transforming the
wilderness of the Tsavo’s Eastern Sector into Kenya’s largest and most famous
National Park.
Kenya-born Daphne Sheldrick
lived and worked alongside her husband raising and rehabilitating many wild
species. She is recognised for perfecting the milk formula for infant milk-dependent
elephants and rhinos.
Daphne and her family have
built the David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust and its pioneering Orphans Project
into a global force for wildlife conservation.
The intensive work of caring
for the elephant babies is carried out by a team of highly trained keepers,
young men proud of their tribal roots and devoted to raising the the dependent
babies into fully-grown, healthy elephants who can survive in the wild.
This remarkable work is made
possible through proceeds from visits to the orphanage and fostering
of babies. I decided to foster 10-month old Jotto, who was recued after he fell
down a well in the Namunyak Conservancy in Samburu. It costs just $50USD (£33)
per year to support one of these precious animals.
We pile in our gigantic yellow
bus and hit the road heading north through the gorgeous Rift Valley to the
Masai Mara camping ground set right on the edge of the magical Lake Naivasha. We were
meant to do a Hippo Cruise on sunset but arrived too late, so Edmund announced
we would get up early and do the cruise at sunrise!
In my first experience of
putting up a tent, my delicate little fingers battle with the metal clips and I
struggle with the metal poles and hoisting the heavy canvas so I’m grateful
that my tent buddy, Merethe is an experienced, hardy camper and takes charge!
Once our tents are set up,
it’s dinnertime and at last I have some skills to offer my camping buddies! I
volunteer to cook and Edmund dubs me “Master Chef”, a grandiose title for
chopping a few veggies and boiling some rice! But I am in my element cooking on
the open fire under a canopy of stars and breathing in the fragrant night air
and listening to the hippos growl and roar!
The nocturnal herbivorous hippos
wander around the grounds at night in search of food then return to the lake to
snooze and keep cool through the day. A mother hippo protecting her baby can be
fierce, fast and dangerous in charging a marauding human so we all snuggle into
our sleeping bags ready for our early morning cruise!
As the sun comes up, the
shimmering lake is beautiful and surreal with masses of twisted trees rising
from the water casting wobbly reflections. We climb aboard a traditional long
boat with our expert boatman Josh at the helm and our cameras poised to capture
huddles of bulbous hippos, sleeping in the shallows.
Josh knows exactly where they
are and we skim across the glassy water to discover two schools of these
massive animals snoozing, their heavy heads resting on each other’s backs, the
little ones staying close to their mothers.
They are comical animals, so
tubby and bloated, on tiny legs. Their adorable faces have huge muzzles, with
hooded eyes, rimmed in tan, set high on their foreheads and funny little ears
poking up – a cross between a French Mastiff and Shrek! It’s easy to love a
hippo but their cuteness is deceptive when I remember they can take a giant
bite out of you on land!
We observe the antics of the
hippos for ages then zoom off to Crescent Island, a natural sanctuary for
gentle prey animals, safe from predators. We spot our first zebras, wildebeest,
impala, water buffalo wallowing in the reeds and a flock of gangly pelicans.
Then just when we think this idyllic
scene can’t get any more thrilling, Josh puts on a show. He whistles to a sea
eagle, throws a fish into the tranquil water and the majestic bird swoops and
catches it and takes flight with slow motion flapping wings into the sky
overhead. Awe-struck at this rare glimpse into the natural world at sunrise, we
zoom across the glistening lake to breakfast and taking down our tents.
I could grow to love this
outdoor life drinking in the beauty and wonder of the wilderness of Africa.
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