130824 Aberdare National Park – Lake Nakuru National Park

The Plan

Continue your African journey to Lake Nakuru. Lunch at the Sarova Lion Hill Game Lodge before an afternoon included game drive. FB L D

Some Information

For bird-lovers (and everyone else), Lake Nakuru offers the most extraordinary winged wonderland you could ever imagine. The lake has the largest flamingo colony in the world. Under particularly suitable conditions, up to 2 million of these birds have been counted, massed ingroups of several thousand on the shallow waters. It’s hard to find adequate words to describe this incredible sight.

How the day turned out

Leaving ‘The Ark” at 8:45am would have made us early for lunch at Sarova Lion Hill Game Lodge at Lake Nakuru National Park, so we jaunted along through the green countryside. Saturday is a busy day in any town and Kenyan towns are very busy on Saturdays. People at the markets by the 100s. We take a break at the crossing of the Equator. A guy there is showing everyone how water changes direction as it empties into a bowl. South of the equator it goes clockwise, north of the equator it goes anti-clockwise, and right on the equator it does not go either direction. Ah, the teachers were right in school.

Almost all roads into the National Parks we have visited, have been gravel roads and often 10 kms or more. This one is a little less than that. We are in a predominantly bird reserve, although there are many wild beasts. Our typical Scenic Tours 3-4 course lunch is ready to meet our appetites on arrival. This is a great place to be.

After 90 minutes rest, we take another safari drive. You might say you could get sick of these safari drives, but if you board your vehicle with a “what are we going to experience today” attitude, you are sure going to see something that will be imbedded in the grey matter for a long time.

We drive around Lake Nakuru and find a few nice looking birds to photograph. A troop of baboons come our way and we stop to let them past. Little tiny ones are ‘attached’ to mothers chest. Earlene captures the moment of the day. It is a rare occasion when she sets her camera to ‘video’, but she manages, to her amazement, to pick up “XXX” rated footage.

We move on to some more swamp birds and find a few black rhinoceros in the distance. Our driver gets a call to another part of the park for ‘something amazing’. On our arrival, there are 20 or so other vehicles all with passengers’ heads through the roof and cameras clicking and whirling. We are watching the all evasive one from the BIG FIVE group – the leopard. There happen to be three leopards. The other four of the BIG FIVE, the lion, the buffalo, the elephant and the rhinoceros, are often seen, but the leopard is a special find. They are in the distance and we manage to get reasonable photos of them. Their coats are so beautiful to behold. They play fight a little and eventually wander into the low undergrowth.

On our return to the lodge, the waiting staff are also overjoyed that we have seen leopard as it is so rare that their guests get to see one, let alone three. A great moment again to retell to our grandchildren.

A kenyan dance group entertain us before another sumptuous dinner, Scenic style. It is Sid’s birthday today and the staff give in a birthday cake and lots of noise to celebrate his day.

Tomorrow, we are off to an orphanage for lunch and then to the Maasai Mara.