Shake and Bake

It’s great once you get there. This is what people who have been on an African safari tell us. It’s the ‘once you get there’ that worried us.

With great anticipation, we set off last Friday for our safari adventure. We met our guide/driver Benjamin early morning in the lobby of our hotel, along with our traveling companions for the next 6 days - Fred and Teresa and their daughter Georgina, from Ireland, and Francis, a 63 year old cancer survivor/ex correctional officer who worked at Folsom Prison. When Francis recently found out she had cancer, she put African Safari way up on her bucket list. She got her last chemo treatment last Wednesday in Sacramento, and was on the plane Thursday morning for Nairobi. A real trooper, Francis is.

It took us a mere hour out of Nairobi to fully understand what people meant by the ‘once you get there’ comment. Our first destination was the Masai Mara National Game Reserve, 150 km from Nairobi. It took us 5-6 hours to get there. This is one of the most popular Game Reserves in Kenya, and yet the road to get there is like one of the worst logging roads up north in Canada, or, come to think of it, one of the better roads in Guinea. Dirt, gravel, rocks, broken asphalt, potholes, gigantic potholes, humungous potholes, you name it, its there, keeping us entertained the whole way. Part of the trip was down the Great Rift Escarpment, on a road built by the Italian prisoners of war during World War II. I wouldn’t be surprised if this road had not been touched since it was built. A whole lot of jiggling and shaking going on in that van.

Furthermore, because of the dust, we had to keep our windows closed, so by mid morning, we were pretty well half baked. I asked Benjamin why the road was so ‘third world’ when Kenya is such not a third world country and that so many tourists use it to get to Masai Mara. Our Kenyan sage/driver/guide, whom, we would soon discover, knows everything and anything that there is to know about Kenya - did you know that giraffes have tongues that are a meter long - informed us that the roads to the majority of game reserves in Kenya are deliberately kept in an impassable state so as to discourage people from traveling on them and consequently, travel the faster and far far more expensive way...by charter flying. African politics, gotta love it.

After Benjamin’s explanation, we kind of all felt a bit better (as in prouder) about enduring our ‘shake and bake’ journey experience...we were taking a stand and making a social statement on behalf of all other tourists on a tight budget out there. So what if it meant that my pancreas would end up in my throat in the process.

Benjamin, who has been driving ‘Safariens’ around for the past 18 years, laughingly encouraged us to look at the journey as a 5 hour African massage. He found that very funny. Benjamin has a funny laugh, a deep baritone laugh, a bit like that black guy in the old Nescafe commercial, you know the one that creeped everyone out by his laugh. Anyways, we enjoyed Benjamin, especially when he laughed. He laughed at his own jokes, he laughed at our reaction when he weaved in and out of highway traffic and incoming cars and trucks come too close for our comfort, and he laughs when we hit potholes, the bigger the pothole, the louder the laugh. Ah yes, he also almost busted a gut laughing when that male ostrich jumped on the female ostrich and engaged in ostrich whoopee. I won’t go into details here, but will say that Benjamin really had a good reason to laugh. Being witness to ostriches making out tends to be funny.

Got to the Mara Sopa Lodge tired, dirty, all shook up, but safe and sound.The Mara Sopa is situated on the slopes of the Oloolamuita hills and the lodge overlooks prime game-viewing land since the reserve is home to almost all of the most coveted game, including the Big 5, as well as being the annual migration destination for massive herds.

By the way, Benjamin, (after the question being asked by Madeleine, of course...) explained why the lion, the elephant, the cheetah, the buffalo, and rhino are called the Big 5. They are supposedly the 5 animals that are the most dangerous to hunt...consequently, if you succeed in catching one, you are a prized hunter. Now, pray tell Benjamin, why is a buffalo so dangerous? Get this...when trying to escape from any one of these animals, one would run up the nearest tree. The elephant and the rhino would push the tree down. The cheetah would climb up the tree to get you. You could not outrun the lion. And the buffalo...and this is where it gets interesting...would pee on his tail, would wag his pee soaked tail at you up on the tree and cause you to fall out of the tree, and then he would smash you with his horns. Quaint.

Lunch, followed by an afternoon snooze, then it was off for our first game drive. Breathtaking.....