18th - Masai Mara

Let’s handle the disappointments first to get that out of the way.

The itinerary says about the two days in Masai Mara, day 7 (yesterday); “the next days we go on game drives morning and afternoon”, day 8; “Today we are once again going on game drives”. So my surprise (and disappointment) was great when I realized that we were having lunch back at the lodge and not going to be picked up until tomorrow morning when we are going back to Nairobi to catch the flight home. The long lunch break in Samburu and this frustratingly restless afternoon means that the 3 promised full day game drives were basically cut down to 2. Needless to say I am not planning on going with this company again.

Anyways, on with the other stuff…

We departed as planned at 0800. Today I had 3 guests with me in the car, a couple and their 2-ish year old daughter. Apparently their guide had to leave to assist some stranded tourists somewhere, so the 3 of them joined us to be delivered to the park’s airstrip where they would need to catch a flight to Mozambique. The guy was Icelandic living in Germany with his Spanish girlfriend (I assume as the spoke Spanish together). Within these couple of hours we share the car I felt a better social interaction going on than before on this trip. Obviously that might not sound like much after my previous rant, but I genuinely enjoyed their company even though I had to sacrifice some of my space in the car. All for a good cause!

Passing through registration was a breeze; we didn’t even stop on the way. I was told later that someone had made a phone call which had made it all the way up to Kenya’s minister of tourism who in turn had made some calls that had made it down to the registration office. He was apparently very unhappy hearing about a Danish minister and his group of VIPs being stuck at registration for hours yesterday.

Anyway; we saw a lot of game as usual, but no cats, not even lions. Someone spotted a leopard crossing the road and we (3 groups in 3 cars and a bunch of other vehicles) starting circling the area the leopard had walked into trying to spot it. But one had to have in mind that the area was still a 3-6sqkm area we were not allowed to enter which meant that the leopard could be hiding anywhere or even have crossed a road somewhere else out of sight and entirely left the area. So the search was without result.

We had a short break where I relocated into group 2’s car so my driver could get the small family to their flight. Coming back was uneventful and the rest of the day I believe has already been covered previously.

Black-backed jackal.

Vulturine guineafowl.

Banded mongoose.

Bored at the lodge in the afternoon until this small fellow came jumping by to take a look. Unfortunately he only stayed a moment before he disappeared up into the trees.