Wednesday, July 25, 2007

Safari Part Three

Here is part three. Sorry it's been a few days. I had 424 pictures to choose from, which I took during the 2 final days of our safari. I hope you like them. These are some of the best of the trip by far.




We left Maasai Mara and headed up through all of the tea plantations toward Nakuru. The drive was gorgeous. It was green for as far as you could see.



This is the best close up picture I got of a Zebra. My camera has a weak zoom feature. Luckily my mac has a great lossless crop feature. The Zebras were interesting the whole trip even though we saw thousands of them.



The flamingos are the main attraction at Lake Nakuru. You wouldn't believe how many of them there were.



There were bones everywhere on the beach where we went to take pictures of the huge pink birds. This one looked yummy.



I had really wanted to see Rhinos while on our safari. Given that heartless people who decide its a good thing to kill animals for fun, driving them to extinction poachers have driven numbers of Black Rhinos to less than 4000 according to Wikipedia, I was afraid that if I didn't see them now, I never would. This was the only Black Rhino that we saw in the park. It was enough for me. It wasn't timid whatsoever. It hardly seems like a sport to kill one. Blah, I should stop or my soap box will fall out.



These Water Buffalo were pretty common around the lake. They looked like a muddy Pippy Longstockings. Again, they weren't timid about us getting really close to them.



This is one of my favorite pictures of the trip. The giraffe posed perfectly in the background. I love the little birds at the feet of the White Rhinos. The driver tried to suggest that they are called white rhinos because their mouthes were so wide. I suggested he take more English lessons. Just kidding, but seriously.



Another wide White Rhino.



I don't know what this bird is called. It looks like the most colorful matchbox car you've ever seen. It sitting on an acacia plant.



Again, Giraffes are posers. This one let us get 10 feet away and took a lil' bow for us.



Baboon.



These lizards are all over Kenya. This is the closest I've gotten to one.



Lets get some shoes... Wait, I mean this crater had steam vents popping up through the trees. It looked pretty amazing.



How in the world did they choose Evanston? A friend implied they meant Evanston Illinois. I can neither confirm or deny that such place exists. But who knows?

Me above Lake Nakuru.



This church looked straight out of "Bed Knobs and Broomsticks." It was really cool. I'll put it into the category of I can't believe I got this going 80 down the highway.



I doubt that this "Comfort Lodge" is either comfortable or Lodgy. It is, however, really really funny.



OK, Man + Speeding semi truck + Connected by Jump rope = Oh M' Gosh, get a friggin picture of this crazy guy. Throw this one into the going 80 down the freeway bin also.



This church was built for workers who constructed the road through the Rift Valley. Its 200 years old and very beautiful. I wish you could see it better, but again 80 down the freeway.



Shortly after this church we pulled of at a shop selling Masai tribe goods. Grace and I had already bought the clothing they wrap themselves in, but wanted a wool blanket. As we realized they were more than what I wanted to pay I started playing the how ridiculously low of a price can I suggest before this guy gives up and leaves game. Just when I thought I had won, the man says "Give me a t shirt." I had planned on leaving most of my clothing behind, but not with this guy. Then it became clear that he wanted to barter and the game became much more interesting indeed. So I went to the back of our van, whipped out my suit case and showed him the blue shirt that I mentioned not owning anymore in part 1. I told him that A. it was a 50 dollar t shirt which he converted to shillings faster than I could. and B. that "the ladies" were going to love it. Luckily I didn't pay close to retail on the shirt, but he ended up giving me the super low prices I had been willing to pay in addition to a t-shirt I planned to give away, and a 3/4 empty bottle of mosquito repellent. IT was AWESOME!!! thanks for tuning in folks.

3 comments:

Nate W. said...

according to the straight line flight distance calculator and an estimate i made for your coordinates, the results are:
New York--11849 km
Evanston IL--12888 km
Evanston WY--14530 km

Who knows? Someone either likes Northwestern U. or hates Chicago....

Jim said...

Hey - all three parts are fantastic. Loved the pics - wish you would have posted a little music behind the scenes... perhaps

http://www.reelclassics.com/Audio_Video/Music7q/clips/mancini_babyelephantwalk_clip.mp3

It probably is Evanston, IL, but Evanston, WY makes for a better story - so I'd go with that.

By the way - I couldn't find a "wool blanket" to "T-Shirt" conversion table on the internet - where did you find that information? Sounds like you got a great deal!

Sheree in GA said...

Is the guy hitching a ride on the semi a common site? Loved all the pictures and the blog. Enjoy your time back at home.