After 2 amazing days in the Serengeti, we left early the next morning for the last park of the trip, the Masai Mara. This was the park I was most excited about because I wanted to catch the great wildebeest migration which was now headed north to the Masai Mara. We had a very long day in the car, it was about 4 hours back to the Kenyan border, where I switched back to my original driver Hassan. From there, we had another 3 hour drive to the Masai Mara, on some of the most jacked up roads you’ve ever seen. It was very slow moving and bumpy but the scenery was really interesting between both crazy nature, rural villages and locals walking along the road either to school or local markets to sell goods, most of which they were balancing on their heads in very impressive fashion. The school children were a lot of fun and loved running alongside the safari jeep and waving at me and would get really excited when I waved back at them.
After a long drive, we arrived at the coolest camp I stayed at on this adventure. Just like the Serengeti camp, this camp was located right in the park, with wildlife roaming around the grounds. It was also very fancy and was staffed mostly by local Masai who were super friendly and helpful and interesting to chat with. After quickly checking in to the camp we went out on an evening game drive and came across a couple female lions feasting on a massive cape buffalo. We were basically right on top of them and got a great view of them gorging themselves.
The next day we had another all day game drive through the park. After spending the morning seeing some lions and trying unsuccessfully to find a black rhino that had been spotted earlier, we headed out to the Masai river in hopes of seeing the massive herd of wildebeests crossing the river infested with hungry crocodiles and lions looking for an easy meal. Unfortunately, the wildebeests were running behind schedule and the big herd had not arrived yet. My guide was unsure as to why but assumed it was because they are some of the dumbest animals on earth and probably got lost. They have a saying in Africa that God created wildebeests in a haste with leftover animal parts because they don’t really make any sense. They have the legs of an antelope, tail of a horse, horns of a buffalo, head of a locust, body of a cow and beard of a goat. They are also extremely stupid and apparently migrate with zebras because the zebras actually know where they are going. Anyway, spoiler alert, we unfortunately didn’t get to see the crazy carnage of a wildebeest river crossing. I guess I’ll have to come back for that someday 😀.
We did see a lot of really cool stuff in the Masai Mara however including the whole big 5, with the exception of the elusive rhino. This included huge herds of elephants, hippos and giraffes, as well as a lot of lions. The fact that the camp was run by the Masai also provided some great entertainment at night, as they would put on performances where they would chat and dance. One night they actually pulled me into their dance and gave me a flannel cloak to put on so I matched them. After 2 days of game drives in the Masai Mara, it was time to head back to Nairobi. As we arrived back in the city, the tour company had arranged one last meal at a restaurant called Carnivore, that was basically the African version of a Brazilian steakhouse, with the waiters bringing around every type of grilled meat you can imagine and continuing to feed you until you tap out from the meat sweats.
Back in Nairobi I met up with my friend KaeAnne from Atlanta who recently moved to Nairobi for her job with the CDC. We spent the day hiking in the Karura forest and got a couple great meals before I had to catch my flight to Zanzibar the next morning.
