RHINO WATCH to SAMBURU – winding down

Wednesday – Today it is time to leave the luxurious surrounds of Rhino Watch and head to our last port of call – Elephant Bedroom Camp at Samburu.  This is my verandah at Rhino Watch – great to sit here with a cool drink and enjoy the afternoon.

Let me say here and now that there was not much time to enjoy this activity – there was always something to do and the thought of ‘I’ll do it later’ was a case of later never came.

My daughter calls me the Energiser Bunny – I am always on the go – sometimes dead on my feet – but always on the go – I drive her crazy when we travel.  That has been the case with past adventures but this one where she is unfortunately not with me, and even though we had something to do every day it was great to sit in the jeep and be driven around while John, Moses, Jess and Chris did the work.  Did I say work?  I wish I had that type of work to do but I am sure that it is a lot of hard work made to look easy by such skilled operators.  All I had to do was look out for our animal friends and take photos – yep – very relaxing.

We had an exceptional Rhino Watch farewell dinner last night.  A wonderful meal where all the staff came to our table and then it was time to enjoy the festivities with jumping in the air – clapping along to their singing and in general having a wonderful time.  It was also Australia Day but unfortunately we did not hear any ‘Advance Australia Fair’ or ‘Click go the Shears’ being sung in Kenyan.

This photo, taken by Jess, is not of it but it will give you an idea of what a good time we had.  This is a celebration for one of the ladies and her husband in the group.  I think it was their anniversary or maybe it was her birthday, and of course, we had cake.

I cannot recommend this place highly enough.  Great food, great accommodation and great staff – why are these places on the other side of the world?  I could easily come back for a long weekend if it was closer.

OK – back to this morning where we have enjoyed another tasty breakfast prepared by our talented chefs and then it’s farewell time, climb in the jeep (yep the red bag is there), plenty of water in our bottles and away we go to Samburu and our rather adventurous accommodation ‘Elephant Bedroom Camp‘.

The day is hot – I have forgotten that we have been up at high altitude and as we get lower it does get hotter. Nevermind, we have our trusty water bottles to keep us refreshed.

We arrive at The Camp early afternoon and are greeted by Maasai that offer refreshing hot citrus towels and a wonderful cold fruit drink.  Always a good idea and an instant way to get into our good books!  Once refreshed we are given our tent numbers so that we can get settled being advised to make sure we lock our netted entrances at all times so the monkeys don’t get in and then we can get ready for the afternoon animal fest.

This is my tent – yep all for me.  Taken from the main building where we have our meals, go to the bar or just in general laze around.  You can see it is only a short walk, nevertheless, we are told we cannot go to our tents by ourselves, especially at night as this is a National Reserve where wild animals have a habit of just popping up out of nowhere and they have right of way (unless you want to be eaten).  I do not so I will obey all the rules thank you very much.  We have a short respite and then we are off to discover more new friends.

Geography Lesson:   Samburu is a national Game Reserve on the banks of the Ewaso Ng’iro river.  The park is 165 km² in size and is situated 350 kilometres from Nairobi.  It ranges in altitude from 800 to 1230m above sea level. In the middle of the reserve, the Ewaso Ng’iro flows through doum palm groves and thick riverine forests.

It provides water, without which the game in this arid region could not survive.  The Reserve was one of the two areas in which conservationists George and Joy Adamson raised Elsa the Lioness made famous in the best selling book and award winning movie Born Free.  Time for a short musical break while I sing a few bars of the Matt Monro classic – feel free to join in.

True to the tradition of animal spotting – the moment we turn out of the camp and into the main reserve elephants are our  first viewing for the afternoon. Those lucky necklaces are certainly working overtime.

Of course we do not have enough jumbo photos so we come to a stop and the excitement is still the same as if it’s our first day.  To see them just rumbling through the surrounds with the river in the background is incredible but we are soon given the hint that maybe, just maybe we have enough photos and there is still lots to see – OK – we take the hint and move on.

Something that we haven’t seen really close up before is a Dik-dik.  What a tiny creature – they stand about 30–40cm at the shoulder, are 50–70cm long; weigh 3–6 kg and can live for up to 10 years.

Dik-diks are named for the alarm calls of the females. In addition to the females’ alarm call, both the male and female make a shrill, whistling sound. These calls may alert other animals to predators – what a helpful little soul.

Now we come to the only X Rated part of the safari – as we are minding our own business we spy two eagles about to boost the eagle population.  Get the camera on bird mode and away we go – – this action lasts for about a minute – I kid you not. Talk about wham, bam, thank you ma’am.

Apologies for the colour of the sky – different ISO ratings so will have to look into that – maybe had ISO on auto for bird mode?

Oh well, just another question thrown into the photographers universe!

Anyway, enough of the eagles having a good time, here is a favourite of mine – the Secretary Bird.  Isn’t it a beauty?  If I have not told you before, the name of Secretary Bird is popularly thought to derive from the crest of long quill-like feathers which give the appearance of a secretary with quill pens tucked behind their ears, as was once common practice. 

And just when you thought you had seen enough elephants, we come across a herd down near the river.

I never get tired of looking at these imposing pachyderms, there is always something going on – females are always protecting the little ones by nudging them hither and yon.

Others seem to stand guard with their ears flapping at everyone which seems to say ‘I’ve got my eye on you, just watch it!’  We haven’t seen them near the water before so this is an extra treat for us.

Isn’t it amazing that you don’t see something until you look closely at the photo?  All the time since the trip I have felt disappointed that there were not many crocodiles.  Well, blow me down – just have a look at the photo to the right.  In the bottom right hand side – to the right of the elephant there is Mr Croc just sunning himself.

Granted it doesn’t look to be a big bugger, then again photos can be deceiving but a croc is a croc is a croc.  Tick another one off the ‘what I saw’ list.

Two more friends – on the left a reticulated giraffe and on the right a new friend – a red billed hornbill.  What a pretty thing eh?  The red-bill lives in open savanna, woodland and thorn scrub and eats fruit, insects and small animals. Hornbills are named because the shape of their bill reminded early people of cattle horns.

Isn’t it great that we are meeting all the characters that starred in The Lion King?  Now we can add Zazu to the list as Zazu is an African Red-Billed Hornbill.

The afternoon is getting away from us and the sunsets in Africa are incredible.  Such a brilliant display of colours it is hard to resist a photo or two before the black surrounds us all.

It is nearly 5.30pm and as we are driving along we get the message that a leopard has been spotted in a tree.  WOW! Time for the classic shot maybe?

When we arrive it is hard to spot him – talk about well camouflaged – I can barely see him.

Right at the top of the tree and of course there is a branch in the way – right across his beautiful face but that is only a minor problem.

It is only a youngster and it looks as if he is keeping an eye out for his mum but she is nowhere to be seen when all of a sudden there is a rustle behind us and there is mum bringing home dinner.

The clever lady has made a kill and is now providing for her cub after having a pretty good feed for herself by the looks of things.

She stops right beside us and has a good look around and as we hurriedly click away she picks up her prize and hot foots it up the tree without  any effort at all.

It happens so fast that it is near impossible to get a really clear photo so these will have to do.

We stay for a while but everything and everyone has disappeared into the tree – we can hear the chomping but cannot see anything so it’s time to leave them in peace to enjoy their meal while we head home to enjoy ours.

Today’s bum shot – Grant’s Gazelle.  Of course he wouldn’t turn around for a face on shot he was too busy eating so he has made his fame by having a famous bum.

Highlight of the day – how can you go past the leopards?