Week 16

For the first 14 weeks in Kenya we had sunshine virtually every day, highs of 25 – 27º and comfortably cool nights. There was one week where we had quite a bit of cloud and two or three different hours with some rain. Good thing we did most of our travels the first 14 weeks.

For the last two weeks we have had rain virtually every day. We are truly in the "long rain season". Most days start off sunny but by some time in the afternoon or early evening it starts to rain. Generally there is a period of very heavy rain for up to one hour. Often there is thunder and lightening. Once time we had hail. Then the rain tapers off and there may be several hours of lighter rain or periods of rain. Often when we wake up at night we can hear it raining. The rain is most welcome in Kenya.

This is our last week in Eldoret and with Professor Sang being away towards the end of the week and some of their children returning to University on Sunday, they had a farewell supper for us Saturday evening. Sangs have been very good to us throughout – we have been most fortunate. Nevertheless, they still decided to give us some farewell gifts. The first picture shows Professor Sang giving me the first gift – a cheetah. If you do not get the significance of that, see our week 13 blog.

 The next picture shows Grace with Jane Sang. Grace is wearing some of the gifts she was given.

 Since the only one of Sang’s guests of the last four months who was around is Grace Idinga of Tanzania, Sangs also invited people of the pastoral staff at Africa Inland Church, where they attend and we have been attending while living in Eldoret (see week 6 blog). The next picture shows us with the senior pastor, Rev Samson Samoei. The last picture shows two other pastors with their spouses, Thomas Kipkurgat of Moi U and Grace Idinga.

This week we need to say a number of goodbyes. On Friday we hope to take an overnight train from Nairobi to Mombasa. This is claimed to be “The most scenic way to travel to Kenya's Coast through Tsavo National park”. We plan to spend the following week at a resort on the Indian Ocean, north of Mombasa.

Week 15

Our life in Kenya is in a “quiet” stage. Eight of the people we have been travelling with (2 Danes, 3 Canadians and 3 Swedes) are home, or on their way home. Grace and I and the two Swedish medical students have less than two weeks left in Eldoret. The two Americans are staying until June. We have had many weekend excursions and are now taking things easy for a couple of weeks before spending a week in Mombasa and a few days around Nairobi to end our visit to Kenya in mid May.

Kenya’s public schools have three month long breaks between semesters, one of them in April, so Grace’s work here is virtually done. She is continuing tutoring a nine-year old boy from Winnipeg who is living across the lane from us. In April I have been giving a series of seminars to graduate students and faculty. The last session is scheduled for April 26. A week later we plan to leave for Mombasa. Most of my classes have been in the Eldoret Hospice, shown below. The Economics department rents the upper floor for their graduate courses.

On our way to Masai Mara on April 6 we passed several groups on a Good Friday pilgrimage to “re-enact” the events we remember on that day. The picture below shows one of the groups.

Since we are in the rainy season with some periods of rain almost every day, there are also quite a few puddles around which has also brought out a few mosquitos. The numbers are not large but with Kenya being a malaria area, Grace and I have begun sleeping in a “tent” – a mosquito net that forms a dome over our bed. The rains have also made everything much greener.

Throughout our stay here we have enjoyed many flowers. Here are pictures of a few of the flowers and also a couple of more pictures about the rural landscape between Eldoret and some of the places we travelled to.

Week 14

It appears Kenya’s “long rains season” has begun – and it is much needed. It has been very dry but on each of the last few days we have had periods of heavy rain. Because of the drought, cows have not had their expected good food source and there is a shortage of milk all across Kenya. We have not found milk for a couple of weeks. One store put up a sign asking us not to take more than two (500 ml) packages of milk. Behind the sign were empty shelves.

This Sunday at the AIC morning service(s) they had a mass wedding. The theme of recent messages has been involvement of God in our lives and families. They encouraged couples that had been living together to get married at one of today’s services. Twelve couples got married during the service we attend. All couples said their vows together but took turns signing the register, so it took some time. They first song played on the video monitor during this time was Just As I Am – not a song we have ever associated with weddings.

We have seen many bicyclists and motorcyclists transporting high loads “to market”. Sometimes they are pushing the bike and can barely balance it. Yesterday Grace saw a motorcyclist with about 20 – 25 squawking chickens hanging from the back of his bike. Not many cyclists carry live product. Most are like the example below.

Road construction in town is much less mechanized that in Canada. The road in front of our place was being constructed when we got here. Large rocks, with a texture somewhat like shale or coal, are delivered. Then, people with sledgehammers break them into sizes suitable for the base. People with smaller hammers break them into smaller pieces for other purposes to eventually providing fairly fine shale like material for infill. Before they spread oil, they bring out the street sweepers – people (generally women) with brooms. Finally, they asphalt the road. Then they finish the ditches as in the pictures below. The ditches are dug by hand and pre-poured forms are laid in place. Lastly, concrete is hand-mixed and trowelled in the gaps to form a finished project. All in all, very labour intensive.

We have recovered from the excitement of last week (see Week 13 for our incredible experience). Since some of our travelling companions have left and more are leaving later this week, we will have three quiet weekends (and weeks) in Eldoret before spending a week at the Indian Ocean near Mombasa and hopefully a short safari from there to Nairobi in the middle of May. This is not the peak tourist season for Kenya, but check one scene from our Masai Mara safari below. There are about 25 safaris just looking in the direction of this picture. Drivers were in constant communication and if one of the more reclusive animals was sighted, safari vans in the area quickly gathered. I have also included some the other wonderful animals I managed to take pictures of last weekend.

Week 13

Wow! What a weekend! What a safari! This week we have a story to tell that we will long remember. I will show many pictures to verify our story, as it is somewhat incredulous. First of all, as you have surmised, this was the weekend for our long awaited safari. We left very early on Friday morning to get to the Masai Mara – Kenya’s most widely celebrated game reserve in the late afternoon. After settling in at our camp we headed out for an evening game drive in pouring rain. The rain came in heavy showers and cooled things off enough to bring out many animals. Within the first hour we saw three of the “Big Five” – elephants, lions and a rhinoceros. The picture below shows many elephants in the background. During the weekend we saw many other animals – giraffes, gazelles, baboons, wildebeest, etc.

For the most part we toured in the Toyota LandCruiser shown below with the roof open and Grace and me standing up in the back. This was a four-wheel drive, which was necessary because of the rain. We towed or pushed many stuck safari vans and even got stuck twice ourselves.

The story of the weekend came Sunday afternoon. As seen in the picture below, we were parked in the middle of an open stretch of grassland to watch the cheetah. The cheetah slowly walked in our direction so I was confident I would get a good close-up picture. The first picture was fully digitally zoomed. The second picture shows the cheetah getting up close and personal.

Sorry, I missed the next picture in which the cheetah jumps onto our LandCruiser. Our Kenya Travel guide claims the cheetah is the world’s fastest runner. That may be, but I am sure it pales in comparison to the speed at which we dove as low as we could in our Cruiser. It was a good thing we had just finished a bathroom break. Even so, we were this close to a second, unplanned bathroom break.

This picture is left to the imagination!

I took the next picture through our open sunroof. The following picture shows the tail hanging in through the open viewing section at the back. I had my finger ¼ inch from the cheetah’s tail. The cheetah was sitting on the folded up canvas roof cover. The open section was about three feet long; the roof portion the cheetah was sitting/standing on was less than 2.5 feet long. There are two pictures showing us in the van. My camera has a movie mode in which the camera captures 2 – 4 seconds of what it saw before a picture was taken. Fortunately, we were able to pass my camera to people in another safari van so I got these pictures and have quite a bit of this in a movie. The camera also records the exact time of each picture. The cheetah was on our cruiser with the roof fully open for just short of 15 minutes. At the time it seemed more like 15 hours. When the cheetah jumped off it did deposit some yellow liquid on my hat.

Our son Brian writes: “looking more closely at your first picture I think I may have identified the reason for your close encounter – (Grace) seems to have dressed a lot like one of the animals that a cheetah would like to have for lunch".

Our driver and tour guide is Max Mugo. If you are ever wanting a safari in the Masai Mara, ask me for his contact information. He really knows the Mara. I also got the impression that he has never met a person he is not willing to help. Grace thought he could make a lot of money towing stuck vehicles in the Mara. I thought he would go broke doing so – he never got a shilling from anyone. I could tell you much more but that will suffice for now. 

In addition to our “highlight of the weekend”, we also had a brief tour of a Masai village. Grace is holding a young infant who did not want to return to his/her mother when we needed to move on. 

Last week we also had a farewell supper for our three Canadian friends from North Bay, Ontario. We will miss them, as they were part of our group on many of our travels.

Week 12

This has been a relatively quiet week so I will go back and include some pictures and highlights I omitted in an effort to keep the length of my blog to one page and 5 pictures. I noticed on Dean Sinclair’s (the American) blog he included more pictures and they did not take long to load. Next weekend is Easter and we are hoping to go on a safari but we are not finding people to go with it may need to wait. Our usual travelling companions either have been, are not going or are waiting for family to come and join them after we leave. The Canadian girls are leaving next weekend.


The first two pictures show some scenes in tea plantation country. In the foreground of the first one is a tea picker. Kenya has among the highest “wages” (pay is based on weight delivered) for tea pickers in Africa. Good pickers earn about $2.58 U.S. per day. However, they don’t want mechanical pickers because at least they have a job.

Here are five more pictures from our trip to Hell’s Gate National Park. The first shows a few Colobus monkeys. Interesting – and they remind us of some similarly coloured animals we have in Manitoba – but very different. The next ones are from the wonderful views in the park and the hike in the canyon. 

Here are some African buffalo, one of the so-called "big five". These are considered second most dangerous, after the lion. However, they let us bike in the park so presumably they are safe if we keep our distance.

This photo shows some private homes in the Kakamenga National Forest.

Here are some scenes from Kerio View. In one the gentleman is sitting at the edge of the cliff enjoying the view of the valley below. The other shows a close up of some of the homes in the valley.

I hope you enjoyed the photos. As you may have surmised, we are really enjoying our stay in Kenya.