Unforgettable wildlife watching experiences in Kenya

Issue 36

Enduringly popular – sometimes dismissed as too popular – Kenya is one of Africa’s top tourist destinations for good reason. It offers a unique combination of accessibility, infrastructure and scenic diversity, along with one of the continent’s best rosters of animal-watching opportunities. If you take steps to avoid the tourist herds, you’ll find huge scope for personal discovery and adventure, says Richard Trillo, author of The Rough Guide to Kenya. 1 WHAT? Riding with the herds WHERE? Kigio Conservancy In an otherwise dull part of Kenya’s Rift Valley between the gardens of Lake Naivasha and the flamingo spectacle at Lake Nakuru, a modest sign points north to Kigio Conservancy. This recent private venture has converted a cattle ranch on the banks of the Malewa river into a thriving sanctuary for the kind of wildlife you can mingle with in relative safety. A breeding herd of rare Rothschild’s giraffes, a pair of docile white rhino, good numbers of zebra, impala, waterbuck and buffalo and several rather over-inquisitive ostrich make for a delightful visit, especially with children. You can rent mountain bikes or take horses and just head off through the bush for a few hours, following an easy network of tracks and landmarks. 2 WHAT? Orphaned elephants WHERE? David Sheldrick Trust, Nairobi After many years of trial and error, Dame Daphne Sheldrick (widow of conservationist David Sheldrick) and her staff have become the world’s experts on hand-rearing baby elephants, sometimes from birth. They use a specially devised milk formula for the youngest infants and the keepers have 24-hour physical guardianship of their charges, a responsibility that includes sleeping with them in their stables. Were it not for the love of a surrogate family and plenty of playtime and stimulation, these orphaned baby elephants would run a high risk of succumbing to fatal infections when teething or growing up unhappy and badly prepared for reintroduction to the wild. Visiting the trust, only for an hour a day, is a delightfully informal and instructive experience. 3 WHAT? Countless wildebeest, guaranteed kills WHERE? Masai Mara National Reserve The Masai Mara in southwest Kenya plays host to the world’s most spectacular animal migration. From August to September, upwards of a million wildebeest stream north from the Serengeti in Tanzania to find grazing in the rich pastures bordering the Mara River. With fragile newborn youngsters trotting alongside the adults, the skittish herds are preyed on by numerous lion prides, clans of hyenas and, most chillingly, crocodiles, which grab them as they cross the surging river. Witnessing this raw natural drama is an extraordinary and humbling experience and not always a comfortable one. In the background, elephant, giraffe, buffalo, topi, zebra, jackals, cheetahs and a dozen other large species play their roles with memorable grace – which can’t always be said for the human visitors. 4 WHAT? Chameleons, forest mammals, blue turacos WHERE? Kakamega Forest A hundred miles north of the Mara lies a compact stand of indigenous forest, just 12 miles from end to end and barely five miles across. Surrounded by rolling tea plantations and shambas (smallholdings) this is perhaps an unlikely site for the last rainforest in western Kenya, but one that is emphatically worth going out of your way to see. Four hundred years ago, when Kenya was still peopled in part by indigenous hunter-gatherers and the Maasai were just starting to arrive, the Kakamega Forest was at the eastern end of a band of jungle that stretched from West Africa. The tall canopy and forest glades are still home to dozens of species found nowhere else in Kenya, including several types of chameleon, giant hammer-headed bats, the nocturnal potto (a slow-moving, lemur-like primate) and the black-cheeked white-nosed monkey (most easily recognised by its red tail). You can wander at will, but forest rangers will always take you out, day or night, for a modest fee. Gaboon vipers lurk in the undergrowth, and otter shrews slip through the streams. For most visitors, however, the stars of Kakamega are the great blue turacos: imagine a pigeon inflated to the size of a turkey, dressed in violet with matching headwear. And still able to fly. 5 WHAT? Bush walks, delightful waterhole viewing WHERE? Il Ngwesi Laikipia is the vast sweep of rangelands, seasonal rivers and ridges that stretches north and northwest of Mount Kenya, towards the northern deserts. Here, former ranches are converting to ecotourism and conservation, and pastoral communities are setting up innovative experiments in tourist development. An outstanding example is Il Ngwesi, a self-contained lodge on a ridge, owned, managed and run by the 6000-strong Laikipiak Maasai community on their group ranch, a 90-minute rough drive from the nearest road. The area swarms with wildlife, but it’s not a national park. You can walk here with armed rangers and Maasai guides. Every afternoon, elephants troop past the bandas (huge rooms, open-to-the-elements, with giant beds and magnificent decks) to drink at the waterhole, which attracts many other species. Banda number one has almost embarrassingly good views. Birdlife is stunning and the hospitality superb and unassuming. You won’t want to leave, although the price may seem hard to swallow. It’s satisfying, however, that all the money goes to the community, and is also enabling them to bring back rhinos, formerly hunted out of the area, and to track and monitor at least one pack of highly endangered wild dogs. 6 WHAT? Crocodiles, crocodiles, crocodiles WHERE? Central Island National Park Briny Lake Turkana, in the wild vastness of Kenya’s harsh northern desert, is home, surprisingly perhaps, to huge numbers of Nile crocodiles. Their main breeding ground is Central Island National Park, a triple volcano poking out of the lake. Two crater lakes on the island are hidden from view until you make the steep climb up from the island’s rocky shore; these are the nesting site of thousands of waterfowl. But, like an African Galapagos, Central Island really belongs to the reptiles. A higher concentration of crocs breed here than anywhere else in Africa. In April or May you can witness the newly hatched croc-lets breaking out of their mothers’ nests and sprinting with loud squeaks down to the crater lake where they spend their first season. Be very careful to avoid unexpected encounters with the adults. With the wind whipping the warm salt air under the looming clouds of the brief northern rains, it’s a fabulously other-worldly little adventure. 7 WHAT? Leopards, elephants, bushbabies WHERE? Shimba Hills Lodge Far nicer than Treetops, which went mad with success long ago, is this coastal tree hotel, built around a waterhole in thick forest in the Shimba Hills National Park, an hour’s drive south of Mombasa. Intimate, and run with gentle attention, you feel the neighbourhood’s animal inhabitants have fully adjusted to this intruder on huge stilts, crouching amid a grove of forest giants whose branches wind through public areas. In the afternoon you might watch large monitor lizards by the waterhole, or elephants as they come to drink. At dinner, as the jungle’s night-time embrace comes palpably close, you’ll see bushbabies scampering through on the lookout for treats. And you also stand a reasonable chance of seeing a leopard, Kenya’s most elusive large predator.

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