The German siblings were only staying for one night in Maasai Mara (because they were going to Zanzibar the next day) so they left already at 6am to do a morning game drive before heading back to town. My group didn’t go until 7am though, by which time the camp already felt completely empty. Apparently two people were supposed to join us to “replace” the Germans but for some reason they had chosen not to, so there were only four of us; even better! We had lots of space to move around in the car under our pop-up open roof top, to get any angle picture we wanted. If someone was in the way, we just asked ‘can I stand there when you’re done taking your photo?’
This day we would do a full day game drive, going more than 60 km to reach the Mara river. On the way there we stopped whenever we saw something interesting; ostriches, vultures, jackals, and we finally spotted a cheetah. Then another one, that was eating…gazelle or impala or something.
When we finally got to the river was it about lunchtime. There there were hippos in the water and we saw a herd of elephants cross the river. One family at a time. The cutest thing was a baby elephant that couldn’t get out of the water due to the slippery mud, and so the mother had to reach for it with its trunk and help pull it out of the water – absolutely adorable! And it took quite some time to get the baby out.
We drove a bit further along the river until we had spotted a crocodile, and some more hippos, and then we went to find some tree (and obviously far away from any lions) to have our picnic. It was sandwiches, some fruit, chicken and a drink. Very nice, although I think mostly because we were just hungry. After lunch, without any animal troubles (except for some small ish spider), we started heading back – again stopping if we saw anything. I was getting a bit ‘stressed’ because we had still only seen three out of the big five, and I really wanted to see a leopard and a rhino but apparently they are the hardest to spot and find. On the way though, we saw two other vans surrounding a tree – so we went to check it out and there, in the branches over a waterpit, a leopard was relaxing on a branch. We observed it for a least 15 more minutes while other vans gathered like a flood around the tree, but we had one of the best views. It barely moved at all the whole time, slightly lifted its head at one point and made a sound, then went back to ‘sleep’. We weren’t as lucky with the rhino though… Although when we just almost at the exit of the park, we saw 2.3 buffalos in a bush by some water and we all reacted because they were such big animals, thinking (or at least hoping) that maybe it had been rhinos, also since some other van had stopped to watch those animals.
We had already seen buffalos so I obviously knew it was them – but one of them was much greyer, and was turning its head into the bush. So I exclaimed: ‘wait! But what’s that one?’ and pointed, but I felt like the driver wasn’t even looking and just continued driving, saying ‘they’re all buffalos!’
‘But it’s grey, not black!’
‘Yes but some of them are just dirty,’ he said, which doesn’t make any sense when you think about it, because rhinos are grey, so if they’re dirty, they might look like buffalos from behind, but since buffalos are black, they can’t look grey from ‘dirt’. I also didn’t see any horns on its head, but it looked like it had horns on the forehead ish.
I insisted one more time but the driver seemed impatient and asked why I was even questioning him… Trust me I still do! I believe I saw a rhino, even though I didn’t catch it on photo. Now I of course regret not having asked him to stop to check it out, because we could ask him to stop anytime we wanted if we wanted to get a picture or something… This felt like a lost cause though – but I am still of the belief it could very well have been a rhino. No one else seemed as convinced though, and asked when was the last time our driver had seen one in Maasai Mara; a month ago, that’s how seldom they were spotted.
We drove all the way back to the camp where it was only 4.30pm. Once again we wouldn’t see the sunset from Maasai Mara.
It was getting cold again but the tent was even colder. The sun was barely shining but the Spanish girl had found a table exactly in the sun, with a book, so I got down next to her, with nothing but my camera, I don’t even know why. I got some tea to heat myself up, and my fingers, and while the Spanish girl was reading, I saw some monkeys jump in the trees and on the roofs just above some of the tents. I pointed it out to the Spanish, just in case she wanted to see, and went closer with my camera, making sure to put my phone in a closed pocket because goodness, some monkeys are thieves!
First we only saw 2 who were sort of fighting in the trees. Then as they came closer and further down, and had given up on their fights, we suddenly saw monkeys all around, must have been at least 3 more than joined, then two more who had babies. The tiny ones were so adorable and were hanging on their mum’s stomachs when they were walking, and one monkey family consisted of mother, father and baby where the parents were helping clean the baby – completely cute! We got really close – and at least I got some really nice shots. Then out of nowhere, and goodness knows why, one of them started running towards us. I didn’t actually get scared or react until, and if not because the Spanish girl let out a cry and started running – so we both ran, the monkey chasing after. Then I turned around to see how close it was, and saw that the Spanish had turned around and was ‘threatening’ it with her book, at which point the monkey stopped chasing her and looked at her. Then we ran a bit further, towards the eating area, where we would probably be safe from whatever danger they could have caused.
We barely dared to go back to our tent, because that’s where the monkeys had been, but eventually we managed, getting under the blankets because of the cold, doing nothing…
When the lights went on, we realized the generator had been put on, so we hurried to the eating area to charge our devices before all the sockets would get filled up.
Very few people were still there so we could charge our things – ish… They either didn’t work, or the light on the chargers blinked when you pressed the charger (or the extension cable) because the they would work for a second, then stop working. It took me two Maasai guys and probably 10-15 minutes for my computer to start properly charging, and then I could charge my phone directly from my computer.
When dinner was served, an American guy started talking to me while queuing for the buffet. He was also studying law, and I got to sit down with his friend when eating. The Spanish girl also joined us, who, by the way, was also a (very young) lawyer. When our driver came to ask if everything was OK, and he introduced himself to the Americans, they said ‘oh, then we’re going with you tomorrow! We were to drive with a Patrick…’ Good to know we had some really nice and easy-to-talk-to people on the next day.
The other Spanish guy from my tour also joined later, and it took me quite some time to hear the news that the Australian had fallen sick, having thrown up five times. I had indeed been strange that he hadn’t been there; he was the social outgoing guy.
We talked the whole night, until 15 minutes or so before they’d turn off the lights. That was fine, because our last game drive would start at 6am.
Day 38 – crocodile meat and Nairobi by night
We got up real early, got only tea or coffee, then we were off. We, being the Americans, the Spanish and me; the Australian wanted to rest and recover before the 5-hour drive back to Nairobi. He had seen most of it anyway I mean. And yes…we didn’t see anything new. The most amazing thing we saw was the wildebeest migration in the horizon with a background of a sun rising above the mountains – absolutely amazing.
We went back to camp to finish up packing, and have breakfast, and then we all left, including of course the Australian. He was feeling fine but still wasn’t ready to eat when we stopped at the same place in Narok for lunch, not even rice or chepatis. Before reaching Narok we had stopped at another place solely for a bathroom break, even though no one needed to go.
After Narok, we stopped again, this time getting a bit annoyed at all the stops, although it seems this one was necessary; the Spanish girl and the Americans were continuing to Lake Nakuru, while the Spanish and me were going back to Nairobi. Our driver would go to Lake Nakuru, but the rest of us would have to get another shuttle, with other people who were heading back. Apparently the shuttle that would be going to Nairobi had broken down on the way…so we had to wait for quite some time. There was an Irish there who had almost only had disappointments with the safari, and he and his safari mates had said Lake Nakuru hadn’t been that great; they had only seen rhinos from so far that they hadn’t even been able to shoot them with a zoom lens. In those terms, I could calm down my ‘jealousy’ of the Spanish girl getting to see the rhinos. No flamingos either it seemed.
Finally, it was decided that some other driver start drive us towards Nairobi, and on our way the other shuttle they had seen from Nairobi would pick us up halfway. It was a freaking messy situation, but eventually I got back ‘home’ at around 4 or 5. The Icelandic hosts had invited me for dinner later. So I changed clothes, then went to the store with the Icelandic woman first to get some water and milk and other necessities, which they apparently had been completely out of in the morning, and I bought some Kenyan coffee and tea (but not much, as I knew my suitcase would probably be completely full).
Then we went to the restaurant. For those who know the Carnivore restaurant in Nairobi, this was a similar concept I hear. There’s a buffet of salads and sides, then you sit down by your table and wait for the waiters. There’s something that looks like a coaster, but works like the signs in hotel, one saying ‘please give me more’ (green colour), the other side saying ‘no thank you’ (red colour). The green side obviously meant the waiters could bring more/ask if we wanted more. The red side meant they didn’t need to stop by the table.
They came with beefsteak, beef ribs, grilled beef, grilled chicken, other type of chicken, grilled lamb, lamb ribs, pork…sausages… The whole piece came on a huge stick, still warm, and if you said ‘yes please’ to the type of meat the brought, they had a knife to cut a piece off (a bit like kebab), and then you had a pincer sort of thing to take the piece that was about to get cut off, and put it on your plate. I could barely fit anything more on my plate after three types of meat. The whole point of going though, had been because they also had crocodile meat. When I had finished everything else (I was surprised I had managed to eat so much at all), we asked for the crocodile, since the crocodile guy still hadn’t passed by. It came in pieces, grilled I believe.
It was a bit like chicken, but slightly more chewy and…I bet if well cooked, still wouldn’t come off in strings, like chicken does. It had been nicely spiced though, and could easily have been confused with chicken in those aspects, as well as the colour.
For dessert, there were pineapples fried in cinnamon; extremely sour but quite good.
We went home, where I took a shower and got ready to get out. I had the key so it was OK that the Icelandics went to sleep. I was meeting a friend back from University, who was coming to pick me up, but I’m guessing quite delayed because he needed to drive his sister first, who was really slow to get ready. He didn’t arrive until around midnight, at which time I had already finished packing and my hair was almost dry. We had to pick up my other Kenyan friend who apparently lived pretty much on the other side of the road, despite having said it was ‘close if you’re coming by car’. African “close”, huh? It also took us longer because we couldn’t find the place.
When we finally found her, we didn’t know where to go, because they said all the good places were back in the Westlands, close to where I lived. We tried Junction, but their bar had closed – so we still ended all the way back in Westlands after a long drive. Then we had to leave his keys with another sister of his, in a bar that we also couldn’t find. He kept saying that if someone had followed his car that evening, they would have thought he was mad, driving back and forth the same streets multiple times due to not finding them.
We eventually found a bar/club ish thing for ourselves, with really quite loud music, and ordered some drinks. I still somehow managed to talk to my uni-mate quite a lot, we had a lot of things to talk about, about Leeds, and then I danced a bit with my other Kenyan friend as well. Some people were dancing, but after all it was only Thursday night…no, Friday morning.
We only stayed for that one drink since I was leaving early in the morning, and it had only meant to be short (and obviously much earlier…) We drove my friend home, this time getting there a lot faster because apparently when going to get her, we had taken a wrong turn in a roundabout. Getting back to my place took longer though, because he took an early turn, and we ended up on a highway towards out of town. It’s really the kind of experience that you don’t tell your parents about beforehand, especially since it was Nairobi. Afterwards you can say: oh, I drove in Nairobi in the middle of the night for about 2 hours. Because yes, I wasn’t home until 3.30am, at which time I of course went straight off to bed.
Day 39 - good bye Africa
I was ready to leave at 9am, the driver waiting for me outside, having said bye to the Icelandics and thanked them so much for everything. I said bye to the gate keeper, whose name I still didn’t know. He said I should come back sometime very soon, and that I would then have to come see him. Then I drove off.
We had driven at 9am just in case traffic was heavy, in which case getting to the airport could apparently take up to two hours or more. I’m guessing it wasn’t too bad, because we got to the airport in one hour. I talked to the driver most of the way, and telling him about the night before and a bit more about my home countries. When we got to the airport, he had got me a bracelet with the Kenyan colours on it, and which said ‘Kenya’. It was admittedly quite huge, since his wrists are huge, and he had been wearing it so that he wouldn’t forget to give it to me. I thanked him a lot of course, very sweet of him to get me something. Then I got my suitcase from the boot, and went into the terminal.
It worked the same way as in Kigali; the first thing you did was scan all of the bags, so only those traveling could get into the building.
Despite the ‘only’ three hours from departure, the check-in counters for Qatar Airways had still not opened. When they did, no one could go directly to the counters because we first needed a sticker on our passports from another guy at a ‘mini’ counter, in front of the place where we were meant to queue. I don’t know what took that guy so long, or why it was so ineffective but I’m pretty sure the checking in itself was faster than passing by that passport guy! Also the line wasn’t completely organized, but I was very surprised to see another white girl who had just pushed herself in front of me in the line, I wasn’t even close to being at the back of it! She was pretty much waving her ticket back and forth, and her passport, and I saw that she was also going to Copenhagen – and was also Swedish. I couldn’t be bothered to tell her to get back in the queue, but still found her quite rude. As a Swedish person she should at least know how to queue… It’s not either as if very many people there were African and that you had to squeeze yourself in front to be able to get anywhere in the queue.
When I got to the passport guy, only second after that girl, he asked if I was traveling with ‘the other young lady’. Of course I more natural reaction (from a non-stalking person) would have been ‘who?’, but instead I just said no.
‘So just a coincidence…’ he said, smilingly to himself while inspecting my passport.
Again, a non-stalker would have said ‘coincidence with what?’ but I replied yeah.
Once checked it, I finally managed to find and buy some stamps, and send off the postcards I had written. I also found an exchange bureau that could exchange my leftovers of Kenyan shillings and Rwandan francs to euros. I couldn’t exchange the Rwandan coins though, and thus still have some 500 RFr. I only meant to keep one coin from each currency; the prettiest ones, and the shiniest ones. I had also found a 1 cent from Trinidad and Tobago on the Kenyan airport floor, so that I had kept too. I’ve otherwise never collected coins…
I was happy to find that this plane had private entertainment systems, unlike what the Qatar-Kampala flight had had. When I got to my row, a black woman was sitting in my seat, and I told her I was supposed to sit there. She seemed to argue a bit but then moved. I later saw she wasn’t even supposed to sit in that row…it really must have been one of her first times in a plane.
When up in the air, in my complete anxiety of choosing between all the good and new films they had, I finally went with The Railway Man. As my headphones were working (despite only one metally thing for two holes) I decided to use them, instead of the ones provided in the seat pocket in front. While watching it, the black woman next to me (who had been in my seat), started watching some film, luckily with English subtitles, because my film had Arabic subtitles, since my film was in English anyway. Luckily, because she wasn’t wearing any headphones… Yet she was laughing and seemed to enjoy the film.
When the food came and I had to take off my headphones anyway, I used to opportunity to poke the woman next to me, telling her that there were headphones in the front pocket, and taking the plastic bag out of there and showing her. She didn’t know where to plug them, and it was a bit dark, so I had to turn the lights on above us (which she of course didn’t know she could either) to see the holes. Then she plugged them, and I turned her light off again, and put my own headphones back on to continue watching. The next funny thing was that apparently she had no sense of ‘watching and learning’ how I was wearing my headphones; because she was wearing the headphones upside down, with the circular thing hanging down, instead of leaning on her head. This time I couldn’t be bothered to say anything, I think she was happy enough anyway. I just laughed a bit to myself.
After the Railway Man I watched The Amazing Spider-Man 2. Damn, Harry Osborn is emo… I like the old Spider-Man’s Harry much better. I was lucky, because the ending of the film was perfectly timed with arriving; no, no, not that we were descending when it finished. It didn’t finish when we landed. It finished as people were getting out of their seats!
Then the waiting in Doha started. I tried to find a seat by a socket, so I could do something proper on my computer without having to save the battery. I found some really nice red chairs, but the chair by the socket was taken by a sleeping woman. I went to check if there were any sockets behind the TV, by the free chair, but there weren’t.
‘You can take this seat,’ said the woman, who had apparently woken up and saw I was looking for sockets. That’s when I saw it was the Swedish girl. She had already started moving her things over to the other chair, so I thanked her, and got my charger out. Unfortunately though, it didn’t work. There were some weird buttons (not on/off) that I tried to press but the light on the charger never went on… So it seemed I was screwed anyway.
Just to make conversation, I asked her where she was going, in English. She seemed surprised that we were going the same place and that we had come from the same place, but obviously no surprise to her. A bit later, conveniently, I realized her Swedish book was lying on the table between our chairs, so I used that opportunity to “break it to her”, asking in Swedish ‘are you Swedish?’
So we ended up talking quite a bit, about our travels and stuff. She had visited her boyfriend who was doing her masters there – and had been there for also about a month, but only in Kenya.
I really think we both appreciated that we could talk to someone to make those 7 hours pass a bit faster, and perhaps even better, one could go eat at a time, so that we could keep those really nice soft chairs while the other left.
When it was my turn to get dinner, I had apparently fallen asleep (although I don’t think it can have been for long because I was fighting myself to fall asleep, and I didn’t wake up by any sound of her coming back, I just opened my eyes and saw she was back…), so I was getting tired, and my contact lenses were making my eyes stick together.
I was a bit lost because the map had said the food court was in the direction from which I had come, but I hadn’t seen any. But there was another restaurant up ahead, so I went to that one but they didn’t have anything interesting there, and nothing much anyway. So I headed back to where I had come to, passing by an information desk on the way, where I thought I’d take the opportunity to ask if Qatar Airways gave any vouchers for a meal while on a long transit. After all, it was a bit odd that you could get a meal, accommodation and transport for free from the airline if you had more than 8 hours, but that you couldn’t get anything on a 7 hour transit…
They directed me to the Qatar Airways desk, so I went there, quite a walk away and asked ‘do you have any meal vouchers for people on long transits?’
He asked how long, and which flights I had been on and were going on. I told him, but then he started talking to some other guy who had come and seemed really worried. I couldn’t be bothered to say anything, just waited patiently, which I think helped, because when he turned to me again he asked if I was with anyone.
‘No,’ I answered, since the Swedish girl had already eaten anyway.
‘Okay, I’ll give you a voucher, but don’t tell anyone, because even I am not allowed to give you one, but I’m giving you one anyway because you’re nice,’ he said, and issued a voucher that he then gave me.
It didn’t pay for my whole meal, but made it a lot cheaper, so that I felt I could get something more expensive; penne carbonara. Actually exactly what I had had in mind, so I was happy to find they had it in the food court, even a really good one, not like the weird one I had had in Africa.
When I got back I went back to sleep with my headphones on, having put my alarm on just in case the Swedish girl would also sleep, but it seemed she stayed up and was writing things most of the time, at least after her computer died. I nevertheless woke up before the alarm, and we decided to head to the gate.
I took out my contacts and went to the toilet one last time before boarding. We had found out that we were coincidently sitting on the same row, although not next to each other… I had asked for a window seat in Nairobi, and the lady had been kind, and clever enough, to give me one the whole way – so I sat by the window, she sat in the middle of the middle seats, probably quite literally the worst seat in the whole row. We got a ‘goody bag’, a small zipped shoulder bag with an eye cover, ear pieces, a travel toothpaste and toothbrush, and some socks. Like on the other planes though, there was also a blanket and a pillow.
This time I was too tired to watch anything and it seemed I had already watched all the things that were the highest on my priority list. So I slept for approximately three hours, then woke up and decided I couldn’t fall asleep. They had also said we would get breakfast soon. I had already missed one meal when I had been asleep.
I felt my throat was really dry but since I knew breakfast would come soon, with something to drink, I couldn’t be bothered to try to call someone. There was a bit more than two hours left of the flight, and there was a Swedish film I thought about watching, because it was quite new, and I know the book it’s based on is extremely popular. First I couldn’t be bothered to, and just listened to some music, but then I thought if I’d change my mind, I had to start watching now if I wanted to finish the film – so I put it on.
I got pancakes for breakfast, while still watching. It had either been that (despite knowing it’d be really sweet), or sausages (and risk that I didn’t like it at all). Then we were about to land – and I managed to finish the film, this time with at least a bit of leftover time, although only to see how cloudy it was over Denmark.
Strangely, I was looking out the window, knowing Denmark was underneath me, I immediately felt, albeit weak, sadness that I had left Africa. When would I see my friends again? I missed Africa in general already, but I had no idea which parts of it or why. I had looked forward to coming back to Europe but now I just wanted to go back… I guess people really do feel like the grass is always greener on the other side, always wanting to be where they’re not.
I went out with the Swedish girl, we went through the passport control together, waited for our luggage, and then went to get our train tickets; she to Lund, me a 10-time card. Then we parted. It was 7.30 am (day 40), and I believe that’s where my Africa trip officially ended.
I am enjoying my time in Denmark, like I always do, meeting friends and some old classmate I actually just ran into. I’ve finally managed to upload my pictures from both of my cameras (it turned out it had nothing to do with my cameras, but my cable…) and there are many stories and thoughts tell, pictures to show, things to think about. I have a lot of picture editing to do (over 1000 items, photos and a few videos) and a bit of private diary writing to do – and of course that article to the Rwandan newspaper! I will return though, quite soon hopefully, with some post-travel reflections, so if you’ve been following my journey, I hope you will read the last bit too.
In the meantime, (sorry for all the cheese): thanks to all of my readers! I’ve had some sky high record statistics, so I’m really thankful. I hope you have enjoyed, and that you will follow me on my next journey – or my next entries, whatever they will be about.