50th Big Bash Birthday Trip - Nairobi to Cape Town Africa Trip

8th Jan 2016

Char dropped us out to the airport to begin the trip to Nairobi via Dubai at noon

 Ran into Reedy, Lindsay, Llewy, Tim and Paul on the way to the club after customs so was good to catch up for a quick chat . Trip went well and had a 3 hour wait for our flight from Singapore to Dubai . I had been trying for 11 months to get an upgrade without any luck so checked again at Singapore and Jo was very pleased when our boarding passes didn't work at the gate and found we had been given an upgrade (that's called doing a Marty A after a mate of mine, you gets upgrades this way regularly)

Got into our Dubai hotel shortly after 2.30 am which was fine as we were very refreshed from out flights. We were staying in the old part of Dubai which reminded us of the places we visited in Jordan and Saudi many years ago. We decided to spend the day sight seeing by buying tickets for the Big Red Bus which is a hop on hop off bus that goes all over Dubai. The boys have spent some serious money to build the various parts of the city over the last 10 - 15 years. We visited the various malls (including the one that has the ski field), tallest building  at 828metres in the world, Sails hotel and many of the island formed into the shape of a palm tree. Arrived home late after lots of sightseeing so a quick dinner and then off to bed.

photo of the original port fort which our hotel was just around the corner from our hotel

 Sunday 10th Jan 

We were flying our at 4pm so there was a walking tour that started just around the corner which was part of the bus ticket so we got a guided tour of the fabric and spice souk with a boat ride across Dubai creek .

 Back to the hotel to get dressed and then off to the airport at 12.30 to spend some quality time in the first class Emirates lounge with quite a few of one of my favourite vodies - Grey Goose.

We arrived into a very chaotic Nairobi airport and after an entertaining time waiting to go through customs we were met by Jan who will be our mechanic along with Amanda who is the tour leader and cook. The Nairobi arrivals building had burnt down some time ago so they have modified the carpark as the arrivals hall which added to the chaos. We were staying  near Karen about 1.5 hours outside of Nairobi at The Castle, Champagne Ridge the place owned by the tour operators Debs and Thiemo who we met when we got in about 11.30 pm so had a quick chat and then a couple of beers before hitting the sack about 12.30.

Monday 11th Jan

We awoke to an amazing view perched on the edge of a cliff overlooking the Great Rift Valley In the heart of Masai land.  

After breakfast we had a trip briefing by Amanda and vehicle overview by Jan. Our Land Rover named Steph which  you  can see above is very well equipped and looks like it's going to be a good work horse for the many miles ahead.

Here's a picture of our journey over the next  8 weeks

Very lazy day at The Castle followed by a nice dinner with lots of laughs and wine with all the team talking about their many various tours in the Middle East and Africa over the last 25 years.

In amongst  some of the health and security concerns we are the only ones that followed through with the booking so find ourselves as the only people on the tour - our very own private tour for the next 8 weeks with Amanda and Jan .. You beauty, our very own personal tour for 2.

Tuesday 12th Jan

Left  the Castle and drove to see the David Sheldrick Elephant Orphanage where they rescue  baby elephants that have been abondanded or injured to then care for then over the next few years and  release them back into the wild. Baby elephants need their mothers milk to survive the first couple of years and it took David 28 years to perfect the formula that they need to survive. They are currently 25 in the bunch that they bring out to feed and provide a detailed briefing to the visitors .

After the visit it was off to lunch at a local shopping centre that was heavily guarded given the past attack on another shopping centre. Managed to get a couple of SIM cards and stocked up on snacks and grog for the next  couple of weeks trip to some  game reserves.

Next it as off to Giraffe Centre which was founded in 1979 to preserve  the endangered Rothschild giraffe of which their are only roughly 1200 that remain in existence. They have a breeding program there they  raise and release the giraffe's back into the wild. 

We certainly weren't prepared to be so close to the giraffes and to also be able to hand feed them - way cool

For the adventurous you could also have them take the pellet from your mouth

Just found my new girlfriend!!

Great way to round off the day and head home for the 1.5 hour drive which is probably only 35 kms.

Wednesday 13th Jan

Left the Castle just before 8am headed for Masai Mara National Reserve, which is about 280kms from Nairobi via the main road that goes to Uganda. It winds itself around the mountains and can be very slow going due to the transport trucks and many breakdowns  they have due to overloading and engines blowing up.

Winding around the mountains 

stopped along the decent down to take another photo of the Rift Valley  and out to the distance is the Masai Mara Reserve

Finally got to the entrance after the 6.5 hour journey and a couple of quick stops along the way.

At the entrance to the park there was some very persistent Masi women selling a range of souvenirs at one stage we thought we would get a set of steak knives thrown in.

Masai Mara is a 1500 square Km game park named in the honour of the Maasai people who are ancestral inhabitants of the area.

All members of the "Big Five" ( lion,leopard,African elephant , Buffalo and black rhinoceros ) are found within the park

We hadn't driven  more than 1 km into the park when we came across ...

We spent around a couple of hours "game driving" and then headed to our campsite with the silhouette of giraffes on the hill tops. After setting up camp couple of beers we sat round the fire place planning our driving over the next couple of days.