Day 11 – Masai Mara, Day 1

Traveling to Masai Mara from Nairobi, the first 3 hours of driving was actually on fairly good roads.  Suddenly the road turns to crap.  It’s paved, well kind of, full of pot holes and the driver spends half of the time driving with 2 wheels off the pavement on dirt on the side of the road.  After about 50 Km the road turns to a very bumpy dirt road.  When we finally arrived at the lodge, it was kind of like being done skiing when you take your ski boots off, such a relief.  Now we’re nursing our sore butts as we write this blog.

The dining area overlooks a river and there were 4 Hippos relaxing on the sand bar but the best part was a mother Hippo with a 3 day newborn right in front of the dining area.  They were fascinating to watch over lunch.  The baby would take a few wobbly steps and then lie down.  Then a few minutes later, she’d do it again, never standing for long.  In the evening the mother and baby were in the water and the baby Hippo was obviously more comfortable there.

We went on a late afternoon game drive and spent most of the time watching a pride of lionesses with their cubs.  They mostly laid around but finally one of the cubs got a little lively and started playing around with her mother and we got some great photos of it.  There was also a male lion that was farther away across the wash that another group was watching.  We drove down there and took some photos of him too. 

At dinner, we were entertained by some male Masai dancers and our waiter told me that the higher they can jump, the more wives they get to marry.  I’m not making this stuff up!  We couldn’t believe how high some of them could jump.  No wonder us white guys only have one wife.   Oh, Judy told me that she spotted a white monkey which turned out to be an albino baboon.

When we checked into the lodge we were surprised to see that our room was the Lucy and Desi room with 2 twin beds.  Judy wanted to sleep in mine but I kicked her out.