Expedition Post 2 of 3

Hamjambo fellow mzungus!

Sorry for the delay in the post, internet has kinda been fritzy lately and I've been busy. Anyway, here is the second installment of Expedition Nakuru 2012. I ended my story at seeing the female leopard, but that wasn't the end of the day. No, there was plenty more to come.

We first sat through a guest lecture by Emily,  a scientist studying the Lake Nakuru National Park ecosystem. I am unsure as to what her research exactly was, but her lecture was mainly a means of understanding the ecosystem, the reasons for the way things are now, and some unique information about the park. The park serves not only as a haven for the local wildlife, but also the critically endangered black rhino and the globally threatened Rothschild giraffe, the largest giraffe in the world.

In the afternoon, we then went on a game drive around the park, familiarizing ourselves with the habitat types, counting animals, and of course, taking a ton of pictures and video. The picture above,  is of the migratory colony of lesser flamingos that call the lake home for specific times of the year. It was there that we also got to see white rhinos up close, and man, were they big. We saw a mother and young calf at a distance, but then were able to see a group of four about ten feet from our vehicle. It was incredible, but did it end there? Of course not! As we were driving back to camp in the evening, we spotted dark shapes on the side of the road and quickly stopped. There they were, a pair of lionesses, just sitting about 20 meters from the road. They were of course sleeping off the day, and were only just waking up enough to put their heads up a couple times, yawn, roll on their backs, and maybe flick their tails. But even with that little activity we stayed captivated, hoping they would move more of course, and sat there for about 45 minutes. Eventually we would head back to camp to go to sleep ourselves after eating a good dinner and settling around the campfire for around a half hour.

The next morning, I was awoken suddenly by the grunting and roaring of grazing hippos outside camp. It was around 4:30, but I still couldn't fall back asleep, so I decided to venture out and make a fire. After the fire started burning brighter, I grabbed some chai and sat down with the night askaris (guards). We talked a bit in Swahili and some Maasai, glad I got to learn a few new words.

After breakfast we went out on a transect field exercise, counting the animals in the particular habitat types, so we could use the data to assess the relationship between species and their habitats in the park. As we drove on to start the exercise, the first animal we came across was a large male lion. You could see the power in his body as he crossed the grassland. He was a BIG cat. I think the manes on the cats at the Center are much fuller and nicer, but he was huge by body size comparison. He was definitely taller and more muscular, and as he crossed the road in front of us you could really see how big he was, even in comparison with the vehicle. What a way to start the day...

TO BE CONTINUED....

Swahili Word of the Day: baridi which means "cold"

Maasai Word of the Day: sidai which means "cool" (like "poa" in Swahili)