Safari Sunday: Nairobi National Park

One of the leading industries in Kenya is tourism, and the most developed and popular form of tourism in the country is going on a Safari. And given the location that Kenya is blessed with, why wouldn’t it be. Kenya has some of the most spectacular scenery on Earth, and a dense wildlife population full of exotic wild species that an American normally only sees in zoos. After only two days in Kenya, I came to the conclusion that every Kenyan assumes that any mzungu (light-skinned foreigner) is here to go on a safari. On first full day here en route to Naivasha, I heard greetings of “Have a nice safari”, and my first few times walking through downtown Nairobi I would have people approaching me from tour companies for safaris. I have to say that in the beginning it was a little unnerving to me because I was not here for the sole reason of tourism; I am here to learn and work. I struggled with this for a short period of time, but came to terms with the fact that there was nothing I could do to change this. I must have done something however because I have not been approached in awhile. I guess I have lost that innocent look of slight wonderment/intrigue/bewilderment that most people have in their eyes whenever they are brand new to a city (especially in Africa). Although I did have some one approach me today about a safari when I was walking downtown by the Hilton (a complete tourist location), but today I just waved him off and said “polle-sana, nilienda safari-ni” (sorry, I already went on safari), and he left.

What I said today is true; I got to go on a safari this past Sunday. Before I came I knew I wanted to go on at least one, and made a list of possible choices. The National Park I still want to go to the most is Amboselli (with its views of Mt. Kilimanjaro as the backdrop), and the Massai-Mara (which is part of the world famous Serengeti), but the most accessible safari location for me to go was Nairobi National Park. This National Park was the first National Park in Kenya, and is also unique because it is only a few miles outside of Nairobi (so you can see and take pictures of the animals but still have the skyscrapers of Nairobi looming as the backdrop). I took the first opportunity that I could to go there, and that presented itself this past Sunday when one of my program-mates parents came to visit for the weekend and came up with the idea.

Our first stop on this wildlife viewing Sunday was a wildlife refugee not affiliated with but on the edge of the National Park called the David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust. This place is absolutely amazing in how much it cares for animals, and its devotion is to rescuing, hand-rearing, and then rereleasing baby elephants and rhinos back into the national parks around Kenya. Effectively, we went to a baby elephant and rhino orphanage. When we walked up I did not notice the baby elephants first, but the fact that the crowd was 100 percent mzungu. But that is to be expected, it is just difficult and noticeable when you’ve been in Kenya for so long to see a sight like this. It will feel different when I return to the States I suppose. But enough of the aside and back to the animals. This animal orphanage is only open to the public strictly from 11am-noon everyday because of the fact that these are orphaned animals that are being reared back for the wild. The first set of elephants that we saw were baby elephants that were six months old or less. During the viewing with the public is one of their bathing and eating times, and there are big water holes in which the elephants play around in with each other and guys shovel water and mud onto the elephants. With the very youngest elephants, because their skin is so sensitive to the sun, workers walk around with umbrellas shading the babies. (This is why if you have ever seen on the discovery channel footage of baby elephants they are usually underneath of their mothers). After about twenty minutes of watching the baby elephants being bathed and fed, they were led away and a few of the older child elephants came charging down in full force and very vocally announcing their entrance. These elephants are between 2 and 3 years old (at 3 the orphanage releases the elephants back into the national parks). These elephants are even more playful and were able to bathe themselves (rather quickly), and took more interest in the branches of leaves that was their lunch. These elephants got their fair share of time bathing and running around playing and walking over to the crowd to be petted, and then they exited and the real star of the show entered for the last ten minutes: an infant three month old baby black rhino. Let me tell you for as huge and forceful as adult rhinos look this baby looked just as vulnerable. It looks like a combination of a large dog and a baby dinosaur, with just a little nub/hole essentially for where its horn will grow. When it made its appearance coming down the hill, it made a beeline straight for us and I fell very fortunate to have gotten to pet this baby rhino. After the one hour we were able to view the babies, we were making our way to the exit, when we saw an adult rhino in a good sized cage hanging out, and the workers let me pet the large rhino as well.

The whole experience at this animal orphanage felt very scripted, but at the same time the workers do quite amazing work. The viewing time just fell into their daily routine of bath and food, and that’s why it felt staged. The workers told us that they are with the elephants constantly, living with them, sleeping with them at nite, and offering their complete devotion to the life in order to rear these animals back from their traumatic experiences of being abandoned (whether by choice of the parents or by death of parents, or by being caught in traps or watering holes).

The next stop on the tour was to what is essentially a zoo at the entrance to Nairobi National Park. This area is technically called a wildlife refuge as well, but it had much worse conditions than the elephant and rhino one we were just at. It was seriously a difference of nite and day. The one positive is that all of the animals have some sort of story of being rescued from poachers or being captured and put on the market to be sold and then being seized by Kenyan Wildlife Services, so that is a plus, but it had the feel of a regular zoo with cages too small and un-lively animals who have the faded, un-lively, broken-spirited look that comes from being institutionalized. There were a few exceptions to this observation however including as we walked in being greeted by a very spirited Benin monkey who was energetic and jumping and climbing around his cage and extremely fun to watch. His enthusiasm was matched by another monkey in a different part of the refuge who was interacting with a worker by taking his hands all over the workers head really giving him a good combing looking for dirt or bugs or whatever. He even would pull the workers shirt away from his body and stick his arms and hands down the workers shirt examining his chest. The worker seemed to enjoy this and would make sounds like the monkey would make to interact and seem like he cared about the monkey. This is in a complete contrast to other workers in the shelter. As we were walking in, we saw people being allowed to walk into the cheetah cage and pet the cheetah, so when we inquired about it the workers said that the boss doesn’t like it and that if we paid them a bribe they would let us in (bribery is huge in Kenya and will get its own post on my serious topics section of the blog once I get more material for it). We were not going to pay a bribe and when we walked away they said ok, so the other guy that went along from my program Brian and I went in and pet a cheetah! The whole situation seemed out of place though and the cheetah was dispirited, and I felt bad for being there but at the same time I am going to take advantage of opportunities to pet a cheetah when I have the chance. So we left the zoo/wildlife refuge, and it was time for our safari.

Before driving into the park we paused at on of the main gates to pop the roof up on our safari vehicle (very cool!). Once we drove into the park I had the idea that it would be more fun riding standing up through the top for the majority of the ride (so that’s what I did). It was beautiful, had shade and a nice breeze, and it gave me an opportunity to utilize my lifeguard skills and began to scan around looking for animals. (I enjoy that much better than looking for potential drowning/misbehaving kids). Almost as soon as we drove down the road we were greeted by a group of monkeys on the side of the rode who were crossing and hanging out. We paused and took pictures, and I began to think we are actually on the safari and this really just happened not even 2 minutes after entering the park. We turned a corner and as I was scanning for more wildlife almost immediately I saw it… bam!! Giraffes out by a watering hole! I was thinking oh my god these are actually wild giraffes in the wilderness and we could actually see them. Over the course of the next few hours we saw many more animals, many herds of zebras (the e is flattened in this British English that they speak here), wildebeest, buffalo, deer, caribou, impala, a few more giraffes, cattle, more monkeys, plenty of ostrich (surprising to me), vultures, and stork. It was incredible to see all of these animals in the wild and it was really unique to be able to see them with Nairobi’s sprawling city and skyscrapers so close to the park, and with planes passing overhead constantly as there is an airport very close. It reminded me of a family trip that was a lot of fun to Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming (if you have never been there I would highly recommend it). On that trip we would drive around looking for the wild animals, and it seemed like the most elusive and hardest to spot on that trip was the black bear. And then all of a sudden we saw black bears on that trip walked right next to our car.

On this safari, Nairobi National Park’s versions of Yellowstone’s black bear are the rhinos and the lions, both extremely elusive to see. Driving around all day, I was hoping to spot a lion just lurking in the tall grass or sleeping or getting ready to pounce. We were on a hunt to spot simba, (simba means lion in Kiswahili, Kenya’s national language). I was really focused on seeing one and kept saying out loud as I was standing through the top of the vehicle scanning the spectacular scenery of sprawling grasslands and rolling hills, simba eco wapi? Kifaru eco wapi (where are the lions, where are the rhinos?) (in Kiswahili). The sun was beginning to drop and we had not seen either one, until:

Brian: “Ryan, confirm for me that those are rhinos.”
Me: “Where?”

B- In the tall grass there.

Me: Yes they are… we found kifaru!

We saw two rhinos in this very tall grass, so well hidden that you could just see the tops of them and their horns protruding out of the grass. We found on of the big ones that made me very happy to see.

And then as we were rounding the next corner, we see a herd of wildebeest and I a crowd of vehicles around taking pictures. I was thinking there is no way that there is a lion there with a herd like that so close, the herd would be running away. But! there was a lion, a female lion lurking in the shrubbery. She made a brief appearance for about two minutes and then disappeared again to take a nap. We waited around for another twenty minutes for another glance, but she was fast asleep and not coming out. As we were leaving the park almost right at the exit gate, it was like we were being escorted out by a jackal (which looks like a hyena), just walking down the road in front of us. I left feeling completely satisfied at having seen everything that I thought I could possibly see. And there were animals all the way through from the immediate beginning to the very end, with being welcomed by a group of monkeys and being ushered away by a jackal. The only big animals that we did not see that are in Nairobi National Park are leopards (which I knew I would not see because they are so stealthy and blend in and hide so well, and hippos, which only come out from the water after dark when the park is closed. I also learned a lot about animals today. It seemed like every time there was a zebra herd, there was a wildebeest herd next to it. This was explained as the zebra eat the top of the grass, and when that is done they move on and the wildebeest move in and eat the bottom of the grass. It was an amazing day and I look forward to more opportunities for wildlife viewing while I am here in Kenya!!