BOS in NBO: Treehouse and Tsavo East!

The first few times people from our Cambridge (Massachusetts) Office came out to Kenya for work, they usually never did any exploring....unless it occurred on the travel back and forth between our corporate housing and office. It broke my damn heart. There's so much of Kenya to love...and so little of it is in Nairobi. I felt pretty strongly that in order to really understand and love Kenya anywhere near as much as I did, they needed to see some of the amazing things Kenya has to offer. So I set it as a goal that the Boston staff who came out to Nairobi would get OUT of Nairobi...which resulted in some fun trips.

First up were Josh and Lisa, who got to experience Watamu Treehouse, one of my favourite places on the planet. This time, rather than flying into Mombasa and driving up the coast, we flew directly into Malindi. Man...what a game changer. Flights leave from Wilson Airport, a tiny airport off Langata Road, and they are quite small - only 19 seats! We flew via SAX (a subsidiary of Fly540) and the round trip fight was only about $150 (each way is about 50 minutes long). The plane flies quite low, giving you a great view of eastern Kenya and you can see Mt. Kilimanjaro just peeking up through the clouds in the distance. It was pretty great.

They WRITE your tickets.

I love that you just walk out amongst the tiny baby planes at Wilson.

Landed in sunny Malindi!!

 

When you fly into Malindi instead of Mombasa the drive from the airport to the house is only about 20 minutes (as opposed to 2.5 hours!) so you're there in a flash. The weekend was spent like any other at Treehouse: amazing food, lounging on the beach, getting massages, repeat. I've taken pictures of the house ad nauseum before (you can see them here), so I won't include those this time.  They were undergoing renovation while I was there, which looks like it is going to be absolutely stunning. They've completely re-done the second tower (which I stayed in last time) to include an elevator, a bunch of new rooms, and a dip pool on the roof! I can't wait to go back in the future. The only real change in the first tower was the addition of another bedroom on the roof. When we went before, there was a bed on the roof with open walls. Now they have converted it into a full rooftop suite with the most amazing shower and phenomenal views.

 

Heading out to go snorkeling!

Man I love this place.

Kalpana and Josh over an amazing spread of food.

Walking to the beach!

Construction in progress!

View from the roof.

This building is going to have the most spectacular view.

They'll have no trees blocking the water!

The new shower.

It was basically a religious experience. I think I took about 15 showers while we were there for the long weekend.

View from bed in the rooftop room. Pure bliss.

The cook, whipping up some delicious coastal delicacies.

Check out that snapper!

Fresh crabs make the Marylander in me so happy.

Perfectly cooked fish.

Fresh shrimp curry.



And amaaaaazing banana bread.



After a beautiful weekend its always hard to say goodbye to the coast. Coming back to Nairobi can just be a real let down, especially during rainy season. This trip was no different...in fact we left the sunny coast and arrived in Nairobi to TORRENTIAL downpours. It was like having buckets of water being thrown at you as you ran across the tarmac. Welcome back to NBO, I guess!

 

Watching the little planelets land at Malindi Airport.

Tiiiiny little plane.

That's Kili peeking up above the clouds in the distance.
 

Oh good, its raining in Nairobi. Well, at least the airline gave us giant umbrellas!

Vacation is officially over.

Later that week I was home alone in Jess and Ben's house in Karen that we were staying in for the month. Living in a house alone on a compound was a lot different than living in an apartment. At night you mostly heard far off strains from a slum night club and the calls of tree hyraxes, but that was about it. We had a night guard with a dog, but that didn't keep me from being on high alert basically all the time because I watch a lot (too many?) of horror movies. Anyway, so I'm sitting at home alone one night in the living room and I hear a tap in the kitchen. Then a couple of more taps. Now every time I watch a horror movie, I'm like "what the hell, don't go investigate that sound!' so my initial instinct was to ignore it. But then it got annoying, and my dislike of repetitive noises outweighed my fear of being murdered.

 

When I get out to the kitchen at first nothing seems amiss. Then I hear a kind of buzzing and another tap. I look up and there's a giant bug hitting the lampshade above me. Now I went to and worked at residential Girl Scout camps for more than 10 years growing up, so I'm no stranger to bugs. I don't really get creeped out by many of them, except for sprickets, and honestly my biggest problem with them is that they jump AT YOU. They're demons, I'm sure of it. So whatever, I figure I can handle this bug, even though it is quite large. I manage to swat it down with a towel and put a cup over it....and...AGH, WHAT IS THAT.

 

AGH.

It was about 1-1.25 inches long, and looked like a wasp and a maggot had a baby. Yeah. Mull that one over. It had a giant distended body and made really loud buzzing noises (think your cellphone set to vibrate on a marble counter top). As I'm inspecting this guy, I hear tapping at the window. I look out...and they're everywhere. EVERYWHERE. I couldn't open the window/door to put this one outside, because I was terrified more would come in. They kept flying up and hitting the window. Tap-tap-buzzbuzzbuzzbuzz-tap-tap. WHY?!

So, obviously, I decided to ignore the problem. I checked to make sure the window was shut, left this bug under the cup, and went back to Netflix in the other room.

And then I heard the loud tapping in the kitchen again. So I went back. And they were somehow getting in, and flying up toward the light. I think they were attracted by our floodlights outside, and then decided, hey, why not move in.  Inspection around the seam of the kitchen windows revealed that they didn't close all the way, and these awful creatures were worming their disgusting little bloated bodies in through the cracks.



 I quickly grabbed tape to close up all the cracks, and they kept trying to get in. You would hear them wiggling around under the packing tape as they tried to burrow in.

They were literally lining up at the window.



I started trapping them as fast as I could, freaking out the whole time because they KEPT COMING and I swear I could feel them crawling on me by this point.

 

 

WHY DO YOU EXIIIIIST?!

Every up, bowl, and glass you see in this picture had a bug underneath it. I couldn't trap them fast enough.

By this point, I'm dangerously close to a mental breakdown. I call Jess in America to ask if anything like this had ever happened before. She doesn't answer. I call my mom. No answer. I start working my way through a list of people who have previously shown an ability to talk me off a ledge. Renee. No answer. Amanda. No answer. FINALLY, Jo Anna picks up the call from a random Kenyan number ringing her cell phone in the middle of the day. She mostly laughs at me as I hysterically repeat "I'VE SEEN THIS HORROR MOVIE. I KNOW HOW THIS ENDS. THIS MIGHT BE GOODBYE. THESE THINGS ARE GOING TO KILL ME." Her co-workers laugh at her laughing at me. My horror subsides just a little.

We get off the phone and I see Amanda has sent me a message on Whatsapp asking if I had accidentally butt-dialed her. I call her back, and she does a little quick internet sleuthing and found out that they are the male larvae of siafu ants. These are ants that travel in long columns and have crazy strong pincher mandibles. If you've ever seen stories of ants with strong enough bites that they are used as emergency sutures in the bush...that's these guys. People will catch them, put their head near the cut, the ant will bite (pulling the side of the wound together), and they'll rip the body off. Yeah. Not super friendly. Thankfully, at this stage, they can't bite or sting. So they're harmless, just really freaking creepy.

To quote Wikipedia: "Male driver ants, sometimes known as 'sausage flies' due to their bloated, sausage-like abdomens, are among the largest ant morphs. Males leave the colony soon after hatching, but are drawn to the scent trail left by a column of siafu once they reach sexual maturity. When a colony of driver ants encounters a male, they tear its wings off and carry it back to the nest to be mated with a virgin queen. As with all ants, the males die shortly afterward."

What a life. The term "bloated, sausage-like abdomens" will haunt my dreams. There are quite a few people in western Kenya and Uganda that eat these bugs. That haunts my dreams as well.

Thankfully, Kate came home from rock climbing a bit later and found me basically huddled up in a corner freaking out. She grabbed some raid and killed all the little monsters.

My heeeero.

Dead and defeated.

 

Fun fact: We never had a problem with sausage flies again. It was just that one, horrifying night, and the massacre that ensued. Moving swiftly along...

 

The next Boston team member to come out was Mary, from our production team. Mary actually stayed with us in the Karen house, and we decided that we would take a weekend trip out to Tsavo East. I really wanted to go to the Voi Unit of the David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust, where they take the orphan baby elephants when they get a little older and aren't totally milk dependent anymore so that they can re-integrate into the wild. David Sheldrick was game warden of Tsavo National Park before it was split into two more manageably-sized parks (Tsavo East and Tsavo West). The drive from Nairobi was pretty straightforward, straight down Mombasa-Nairobi Road towards the coast, so I decided to take Jess and Ben's car, which, I had been driving to work on and off.

 

Quick side story about how I learned to drive in Kenya....I had always said that I would never drive in Nairobi because it was way too crazy. I preferred to sit in a car with a driver who knew how to navigate the giant potholes and seeming lack of any sort of rule or order. Then, one day, we were on our way to work from Karen in one of Harrison's big vans with a new driver. We went at a snails pace down Langata Road, as per usual, and then got to the first turn around where you can hop on the bypass. We told him to pop a u-turn, because we'd made u-turns there many times in the past with other, more experienced drivers. He did as we asked, and IMMEDIATELY got pulled over by a police officer, because apparently this was a "no-U-turn, only right turn" lane. Not that there were any signs to indicate that.

 

We, and the other cars who had been pulled over, went caravan-style to the Langata police barracks. The police officer talked to Tony, the driver, and then came back to talk to us. He started by asking if I had a drivers' license, and I laughed and said I had an American one, but not a Kenyan one. "Oh, that's fine," he said "you should drive to work." "Um...no. I don't think so." I replied. We went back and forth like this for a while. Then he said "Well your driver is being arrested and has to go to court. he cannot drive you. So if you want to go to work, you must drive."

 

What.  I call Harrison, figuring he'll be the voice of reason, and send another driver. "Yeah, go ahead and take the van to work, I'll pick it up there," he said. Not exactly the answer I had anticipated. Kate tried to argue with the police officer for a bit, but he wasn't having it, and eventually just took Tony away and left us there. So we didn't really have another choice. I hopped behind the steering wheel, took a deep breath, and off we went. And...surprisingly...it wasn't so bad. I made it to work alive (through multiple roundabouts, which is what I was most concerned about) and we weren't even horribly late. Harrison bailed out Tony, and then came to pick up the van and keys and we just went about business as usual. And that's when I started driving in Kenya, which led me to drive in Uganda (which I talked about last entry) and Zambia (which is coming down the pike). Never looked back.

 

Steph joined Kate, Mary, and me in Karen, and then we drove out to meet Mike, Marisa, and Nora at a gas station on Mombasa Road to head out. I had estimated that the trip would take about 4 hours, having looked at the distance from Nairobi to Tsavo East. However I failed to realize that I had to drive the entire length of the park to get to Voi, which is on the far side. It ended up taking us about six hours, made all the more stressful by the fact that driving on Mombasa Road is basically a continuous game of leap frog with giant trucks as they speed between the port and all points west. It was...not fun. However we did get to drive through some beautiful scenery. And I laughed a lot when we stopped to pee on the side of the road and an unnamed member of our party got tangled in brambles and had to be rescued. So it for sure could have been worse.

 

We finally made it to Manyatta Camp, which was really lovely. A series of luxury tents back right up to the National Park, and each tent comes with a tiny dip pool overlooking the beautiful natural surroundings. For some reason I must not have taken many pictures of the tents, but this one from TripAdvisor pretty accurately captures what I remember it looking like:

 

Totally relaxing.

 

We grabbed a quick lunch at the lodge, and then headed out to meet the orphans! I have talked ad nauseum about how amazing DSWT is...and nothing I've ever seen has changed my mind about this. Especially not visiting the Voi Reintegration Unit. Baby elephants are totally milk dependent for about the first three years. During that time, the babies stay at the Nairobi unit where they can be fed every three hours and, as they get older, take little field trips out into the park under the watchful eye of the keepers. When the orphan are a bit older, they are set to one of three units that facilitate their reintegration into the wild: Voi, Ithumba, and Kibwezi Springs. These units provide safe places for the young ones to get supplementary milk and sleep while finding their new wild herds.

 

Herds of elephants are extremely tight knit groups of some of the smartest animals on the planet. They stay in family groups, mostly made up of females and their babies. A single matriarch, the keeper of all of the important information about that herd's history and survival, runs the show. Elephants are protective of their families and sometimes wary of bringing in an outsider. However the herds in Tsavo east are a bit different. There is a huge herd there whose matriarch is named Emily...and she was a former orphan.

 

Emily was rescued after falling down an unused pit latrine in 1993. It took her months to physically and emotionally recover from this awful experience, and there were many times when it didn't look promising. She lived in the Nairobi unit for two years, where she always played a motherly role with the other orphans. The DSWT website tells the following story, which is just so precious: Emily took care of an orphan named Aitong, "who had suffered a blow to the head that left her able only to walk in circles for weeks. By holding onto the tail of either Emily or Imenti, she eventually managed to walk in a straight line, and also made a full recovery." Come. On.

 

Emily was reintegrated into Tsavo East through the Voi Unit, and after mating with a wild bull, in 2008 she gave birth to baby Eve, becoming the first orphan hand-reared from early infancy to have a baby in the wild. Five days after giving birth, she brought the baby back to the stockades to introduce it to her human family, as if to say "look what I made!" This story basically makes me cry every time I tell it, haha. It just so succinctly illustrates the power of this incredible organization.

 

Now Emily is matriarch of her own herd, which is made up of many ex-orphans. (And has another baby, Emma, who she actually had at the stockades in January of this year!) They welcome newly integrating ex-orphans into the herd, protecting them and teaching them how to be wild elephants. It is really phenomenal. 

 

So...yeah, I was excited to see the place where it all started, and experience the re-integration unit in action, haha. You can only visit the Voi unit if you are an adoptive parent already. You have to call or email in advance to set up a 5pm viewing, which is when the ex-orphans come back from playing in the wild all day to have a bottle and go to bed. Its an easy process once you've set it up - you don't have to pay park fees for that night, and its easily accessible from the Voi Gate of Tsavo West.

 

Entrance to the Voi Re-Integration Unit.

You should follow DSWT on Instagram (@dswt) if you aren't yet. You WILL NOT regret it.

Where the keepers stay.

Mobile units.

These stockades protect the babies from predators at night.

The unit has a beautiful view over Tsavo East.

Enter the baaaaabies.

Double feeding action.

So pretty.

Striking a pose.

I can do this myself.

This little one needs some fattening up.

Oh yeah, this is the good stuff.

Hungry baby elephants go through milk REALLY fast.

They drink huge quantities of human baby formula, which is why financial support through their fostering programme is  so incredibly important.

Washing down the milk with some water.

Just like human toddlers. I CAN FEED MYSELF!

Some of the bigger babies back for a visit.

All different sizes of ex-orphan friends.

Everyone enjoying a sip.



Love!

Kind of hard to put your arm around a 5 year old elephant.

The eles also eat the bark off of these branches.

Chomp, twist, and pull so you get the best bark.

When they're done the keepers collect the stripped branches and use it for firewood.

DSWT doesn't just take care of orphaned elephants, they also have a twee little orphaned zebra here, as well was impalas, gerenuks, giraffes, ostriches, warthogs, and more.

Having a snack before bedtime.

Just hanging out. You can see the stripped branches on the ground.

All grins from the keeper, Julius, and one of his friends.

Nom nom nom.

Crunch.

It was seriously a fantastic experience. If you aren't a foster parent yet, adopt! If you are, go visit Voi stockades!

On the way back to our hotel, we spotted a hotel/resort perched on top of a bluff overlooking the park. We made a spur of the moment decision to go check it out, and were treated to a fabulous view as we had nightcaps.

A table right along the edge.

Little tree hyraxes playing.

Beautiful views.

These little guys are the most adept climbers...especially considering they have tubby little bodies.



All smiles with Mary, Steph, and Kate.



It was a good end to a long day!
Mary, Kate, Steph, me.





That night we had a relaxing dinner and then turned in early since we were going to wake up early the next morning. Up before sunrise, we got picked up by a driver and headed into the park. Mike and Marisa joined us in our van and brought their one year old, Nora. Nora stayed awake long enough to see a giraffe and then conked out for the rest of the three hour ride, haha.

 

The sun was so perfectly round as it rose over Tsavo.

It looked like it as going to set the trees on fire.

The road into the park. As we were driving in a cheetah chased an antelope across the road right in front of us, but it was way too fast to snap a picture. Pretty cool wake up call!



Those are the tents in Manyatta Camp, backing right up to the park. Gorgeous.

Just giraffing around.

Oh hai.

A little back lighting.

Mind if I cross here?

These little ones weren't so sure it was safe to follow mom.

But finally emerged to join her on the other side of the road.

One of the things that makes me love Tsavo East and Amboseli so much is the wide variation in colours. It is so beautiful.

Love me some bendy necked giraffes.

This guy had seen better days.

He definitely lost a fight..and therefore an eye and a horn.

Love the trees and colours.



And that red soil! Stunning.

Well hello, fuzzy friend.

Our first large herd of elephants.

Tsavo is home to some of the largest herds left in the Kenyan wilderness.

Forming an orderly line for the watering hole.

Someone got a little dirty....

Buds.

Yeah, that's probably how you got so dirty.

Gah what a cool animal!

Seriously, look at those colours!

Accusatory looks.

Just plain beautiful.

The red giants of Tsavo.

They had elephants with some of the biggest tusks I've ever seen.

Family.

Gorgeous tusks.

Just hanging out in the PERFECT weather.

Gnoshing on some shrubs.

DELICIOUS!

Sigh. Phenomenal landscape.

It is so lovely to see huge herds all together out in the wild.

And so many little ones!

Seriously, look at the tusks on that one on the left! They almost touch the ground.

And this is why I hate poachers.

Just popping in to say hello.

So majestic.



God damn I love safaris!



After our morning game drive we headed back to the hotel, ate, lounged by the pool and absorbed some sun before heading back to Nairobi.

 

Kate getting some sun.

 

During the 12 hours of driving that weekend between Nairobi and Voi, we encountered the worst livestock road deaths I have ever seen. On the way out we came around a bend to discover a donkey in the middle of the road that had been almost completely decapitated. On the way home, we encountered a 500m or so stretch of road where it appeared that a 16-wheeler had gone through a herd of goats...absolute carnage everywhere (not to mention the devastation it probably caused to that herder's income). It was insane. I just remember meeting Mike's eyes in the car behind me when I looked in the rearview mirror and sharing a "What in the hell is happening?!" look.

 

The following weekend was Mary's last in Kenya so we wanted to take her out for a nice dinner. The same crew (me, Steph, Mary, and Kate) went out for a lovely lunch at Rolf's Place, right along the edge of the Nairobi National Park. I  definitely felt better when people left this time, knowing that they had seen so much more of the Kenya that I love!

 

 

A beautiful day for Rolf's!

You have to cross a suspension bridge over a gorge to get there...it is not my favourite part.

Indoor safari décor.

Lunch on the patio!

Pausing to pose.
Me, Steph, Mary, and Kate