School visit and a sundowner

November 17 – visit to Loigero Primary School, transfer to Saruni Basecamp Wilderness in Naboisho, and a game drive with a sundowner

This morning we left Tembo by Jackson and headed on a game drive in the direction of Loigero primary school. Another vehicle in our group saw a lioness hunting in some tall grass so we headed that direction. We did not see her hunting, but we saw her carrying a baby warthog, presumably back to her cubs. She crossed the river in front of us and disappeared into long grass.

We continued on and arrived at the school where we were welcome by a group of children. It’s currently the equivalent of summer break here in Kenya, so no kids are actually attending school daily, but the headmaster asked a number of students to come in just for the day to see us. We brought out all the donations that Greg brought with him and the items we purchased yesterday. The donations Greg brought included shoes, clothes, medical supplies, and teddy bears.

This school was built in 2003 at which time it was a temporary structure and there were 30 students, 29 boys and 1 girl. This year the school has 950 total students, 430 of which are girls. Some of the kids come to school every day, while others are there at boarding school. Many of them live multiple kilometers away and if they walked, they would be travelling up to 50km a day just to go to school. The school has numerous connections to Alberta and different parts of the school have been sponsored by groups and individuals from Lacombe, Red Deer, Edmonton, Olds, and Calgary.

The youngest kids, who were 4 and 5 years old, all got the teddy bears, while the older kids got to take their pick of the clothes and shoes. We then took the bubbles and soccer balls and went out to the field to play. The kids were enamoured with all of us. They wanted to touch our skin and hair, ask about watches and jewelry, some kids were even asking one of the guys about his hearings aids and gold fillings.

We left the school and headed out to meet the drivers of the next camp in Naboisho. We switched vehicles to the new camp at the border of the Maasai Mara and Naboisho conservancy and went on a short game drive towards our next camp, Basecamp Wilderness.

The guides knew where a leopard had been the day before, so we headed straight for that area and almost immediately found a leopard in the tree. The light wasn’t great and there were multiple vehicles in the area so we moved on and headed to camp.

We checked into the new camp, had lunch, and got settled in our tents.

Our evening game drive started off with an Agama lizard sunbathing in the top of the rock. The males are beautiful blue and red (Greg calls them Spider-Man lizards), while the females are plain brown.

In the distance, the e could see a large parade of elephants. We drove down into the valley and waited for them to come closer. There were multiple baby elephants. The guides estimated that the youngest calf was around 3 weeks old.

Continuing on, our guide heard that someone has spotted the resident female leopard and her cub, so we headed that direction and when we arrived they were in the ground with the cub running and playing. Shortly after they both climbed up a tree. The cub continued to play while the mom kept an eye out for dinner.

We watched the leopards until they went down the tree and out of sight. We then headed for a sundowner, which is a drink and a snack watching the sunset. the sky glowed orange which provided a good opportunity for silhouettes, of animals and people alike.

Thanks for wandering with me,

Julie