11th – 12th - Arriving in Nairobi

Going to Nairobi from Copenhagen required a layover in Amsterdam, in my case a 1½ hour one. Therefore, knowing Schiphol is a large airport, I began getting slightly nervous when we hadn’t moved half an hour after the planned departure time. After having solved the technical problems of the plane (which required a full restart – that sounded familiar!) we were on our way. They managed to cut off half an hour of the 1½ hour flight so we arrived in Amsterdam only half an hour late.

I quickly got myself to the net gate where they already had started boarding. Getting through the gate’s security was swift, maybe a little too fast. When everyone had been seated they asked over the plane’s speakers if anyone where missing a Samsung tablet found in the security check. Ah, funny, someone’s got the same as me. It even looks the same! … wait a minute…. Yeah, that was mine. Woops.

The flight to Nairobi was otherwise uneventful. Immigration at the airport was annoyingly slow but after almost 2 hours after arriving I finally came out on the other side and was picked up and driven to the hotel.

I had a 2 hours break before continuing with the trip’s schedule where a needed shower was had. Amazing standard of the hotel room (especially considering my usual camping), but unfortunately they did not have a room available which I was supposed to have. This meant that they had to upgrade me to a larger room. Oh well, I’d just have to live with that.

At 1030 we departed to go to the giraffe center. We got to stand on a balcony to feed giraffes eye to eye, saw a presentation on giraffes (“this is how you see the difference between the three types, they have as many vertebras as humans but bigger, here are some bones, any questions?”), and that was it. It was quite a disappointment, to be honest.

After this we went to Karen Blixen’s coffee farm to have lunch, great food. This was followed by a visit to Karen Blixen’s museum where we were guided around. Our guide had a thick accent, spoke fast and mumbled so it was quite difficult hearing and understanding everything he said.

After a couple of hours at the museum and a couple of hours break at the hotel we went to the restaurant Carnivore for dinner. Plenty of meat was mounted on an enormous grill in the middle of the building. We were given a flag and as long as it was standing up the waiters would regularly show up with more meat. Most of the meat was relatively ordinary (beef, lamb, pork etc.) but we were also served bulls’ testicles (the smelled stable-ish but tasted like something towards liver, with a firm but soft structure).

This was finished by a visit at the bar in the hotel where incomprehensible bills, confusing bartenders made it seem like they managed to cheat us (me) of 1700KSh. Nice.

Close encounter!

Never underestimate a good scratch on the nose.