Tag: Safari

2018-08-27 – Kenyan Safari

Posted in Photography, TravelTagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

I just finished a seven day Safari organized by GoWay and fulfilled by Sense of Africa. My truck, driven by a fantastic driver named Daniel, had four other Canadians with me from the Toronto area; a retired couple named Brian and Kelly and a young couple named Courtney and Nick.

The trip started out with two days in Samburu National Reserve. Accommodation was at the Serena Samburu Safari Lodge, where we stayed in luxury tents and were woken up with coffee and cookies delivered right to our tent door, followed by breakfast and a game drive. The afternoons were spent relaxing, followed by an evening game drive and a five course dinner.

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The third day consisted of driving to Mount Kenya National Park. Accommodation was at the Serena Mountain Lodge, a rustic mountain hotel-lodge in the dense rainforest in Mount Kenya. We had views of the buffalo drinking from the water hole. I saw the occasional owl and hyena. Dinner was a five course meal and breakfast the following day was a five course meal as well as a buffet.

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On the fourth day we drove through Lake Nakuru National Park where we saw a few black rhinos and flamingos, before arriving at Serena Lake Elementaita Camp, where we stayed at some ultra luxury permanent tents with rainfall showers. Dinner was a five course meal.

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On the fifth day we ate a five course breakfast and drove to the Maasi Mara, with a quick stop at a Maasi village where we were shown the traditional ways of life that the Maasi people live. It was neat to see but left a bad memory when we were separated from each other and pressured into buying things that were supposedly made by hand but clearly mass manufactured. We spent the next two days at the Serena Mara Safari Lodge, a luxurious hotel that resembles something that Antoni Gaudi would have created. We had a morning and evening game drive on both days, and I enjoyed a hippo breakfast on the second day in Mara while the other four completed a somewhat disappointing balloon ride. This time of year the great migration was occurring and we got to see an amazing amount of animals migrating.

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On the seventh and final day we ventured 7 hours back to Nairobi. I’m spending the night in the Hilton hotel near the airport before I head to Athena, Greece tomorrow morning.

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2018-08-21 – Samburu National Reserve

Posted in Outdoors, TravelTagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Today I woke up at 3:00am. Apparently I’m a bit jetlagged! I caught up on social media, went down for the breakfast buffet and waited to be picked up on my Safari tour. I was picked up at 7:30am and made a quick stop at another nearby hotel to pick up the remainder of my group. I chose to stay at a different hotel to save a bit of money. There are 8 other people in my group distributed between 2 vehicles. I have four other people in my vehicle; Kelly and Brian from near Toronto, and Nick and Courtney also from near Toronto.

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The day started off with a three hour drive to Trout Tree Restaurant where we had lunch. At Trout Tree they have their own hatchery right there so you’re guaranteed the freshest fish you’ll ever feast your eyes on. I’m not a fish person so I had a delicious steak with potatoes and a small salad, but everyone who had the fish said it was amazing. We continued on another three hours until we got to Samburu National Reserve where we did two hours of game drives until we ran out of sun.

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The Samburu National Reserve is a game reserve on the banks of the Ewaso Ng’iro river in Kenya. On the other side of the river is the Buffalo Springs National Reserve. The park is quite large; 165 km² in size and is situated about 350 kilometers from Nairobi. The altitude in the park ranged from 800 to 1200 metres above sea level.

We checked into Samburu Intrepid’s Camp. The rooms are in permanent tents and are quite well appointed. We had dinner straight away; a delicious five course meal. The main course was an option between pasta, chicken or steak; I opted for the steak again.

After dinner it was around 10:00pm and I was exhausted so I went to bed right away

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2018-08-20 – Nairobi, Kenya

Posted in Architecture, Photography, TravelTagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Today I woke up at 7:30am. I had a shower and went downstairs to have a buffet breakfast, which was complimentary. The buffet had an excellent selection of cheeses, meats, omelets, sausages, pancakes, etc.

After having breakfast I went and explored the city of Nairobi and bought some groceries as the hotel lunch and dinner menus are exceptionally expensive. I purchased a muffin, yoghurt, bananas, oranges, and a bag of chips for under $5 USD at a local market called Tusky’s!

Since I didn’t have too much going on today I did a lot of reading on the history of Kenya, and the capital City; Nairobi. I’ve consolidated the information that i read into something that you can read in about five minutes.

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Kenya has seen human habitation since the begging of the Lower Paleolithic, back over 3.2 million years ago! In 2011 stone tools were discovered at Lomekwi near Lake Turkana, and these are the oldest stone tools found in the world. Kenya is a very ethnically diverse country with a mixture of African, Arabs, European and Asian individuals. There are 69 different languages spoken in Kenya, with English and Swahili being the most common spoken.

There are over 48 million people living in Kenya (estimated as the last official census was in 2009 and that census had some controversy behind it), and just over 6.5 million people residing in the capital city of Nairobi (including the metropolitan area).

Kenya was colonized by the British from 1888 to 1962. Nairobi was founded in 1899 by the colonial authorities in British East Africa, as a rail depot on the Uganda Railway. The town grew quickly and replaced Machakos as the capital city in 1907. After gaining independence from the British in 1963, Nairobi became the capital city of the Republic of Kenya.

Kenya’s economy relies heavily on Tourism, Agriculture, Industrial Manufacturing, Telecommunication, and Finance. Telecommunication and Finance account for about 60% of the total GDP of the country, and only 20% comes from agriculture even though that over 75% of the workforce is employed in Agriculture. Kenya’s economy is just starting to boom and is it definitely shows when I was walking the streets of Nairobi. You see a lot of economic diversity on the streets. On one street you see wealthier business people dressed in suits with laptops, cellphones, and nicer cars; then on the next street you see slums with tents and people selling textiles and food. 20% of Kenyans live on only $1.25/day but that wage is rising sharply with the economic growth!

As with any developing country with a developing economy there is a rather unwelcome problem of pollution in the form deforestation, water shortage, degraded water quality, and air pollution.

The main source of water pollution in Kenya is the direct and indirect discharge of raw sewage into water bodies. According to the UN Environment over 80% of the world’s water is released into the environment without treatment.

The main source of air pollution in Kenya is from industrial activity and the use of low quality fuels and diesel. Kenya is one of the few African countries that doesn’t use leaded petrol thankfully. According to the UN environment, overall environmental degradation causes 1 out of 4 deaths worldwide. This is an alarming statistic!

Kenya has taken some initiative to try to and solve some of the issues. One of these solutions was to ban plastic bags by imposing some of the world’s stiffest fines. I have noticed no plastic bags so far so I can definitely say this is helping. There is still a huge use of plastic for water bottles as the water in the country is mostly undrinkable due to contamination. Nairobi supposedly has water that is drinkable, but I’m not going to chance it. Another initiative that was taken was to built a Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) network in Nairobi, where traffic jams plague the city. People on average spend 3-5 hours stuck in gridlock and it has a huge tole on the air quality and economy; as its believed to cost 2% of the country’s GDP in lost productivity! I can believe it as I find the air pollution stifling here; even worse than what I experienced in my travels to Thailand and limited travels in China.

Another positive is that 87% of Kenya’s main grid electricity (not including personal diesel generators) is generated from geothermal heat, water, and wind, which puts it up there with Iceland and Costa Rica in terms of clean energy production. Way to go Kenya!

Continue following my blog as tomorrow I start my 8 day Kenyan Safari trip; so you’ll be sure to see lots of photos of animals in the wild!

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2018-08-19 – Still Travelling to Kenya

Posted in Aviation, Photography, TravelTagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , 1 Comment

Today my journey to Nairobi, Kenya continues. I deliberately slept in until 11:30am so that I could start to get acclimatized to Nairobi’s time zone. I took the Hilton airport shuttle to Toronto Pearson International Airport, had a burrito from Freshii, which was actually pretty good, and then checked in for my flight as I was unable to do so online. After checking in for my flight I went through security and sat down at this place called Beer Hive and ordered a Muskoka Brewery Mad Tom IPA. I took some pictures of planes while I was waiting for my Jet Airways India flight to Amsterdam.

I try to be as positive as possible about my travel experiences but Jet Airways India is a pretty lousy airline. The Boeing 777 was 10 abreast instead of the typical 9, the interior was very worn and dated including the seat cushions, and the onboard service was deplorable. They’ve in the news lately because they’re concerned they will not have enough money to continue operating past the end of August as their main financial backer; Etihad has decided not to continue funding the failing airline. Perhaps if they spent more money on providing a quality experience then perhaps people would fly them.

Anyways onto the positives; upon arrival in Amsterdam, which is an absolutely wonderful airport, I went and checked in to a cute pod hotel called YOTEL. I had four hours of sleep before boarding the next and final leg of my flights to Nairobi, Kenya. The pod had an extremely comfortable mattress and a nice thick duvet on top. It felt nice with the air conditioning blasted but having a thick duvet on. When I woke up I was able to shower in my own mini personal shower in the pod.

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The flight from Amsterdam to Nairobi was on a KLM Boeing 747-400M, which is actually the last Boeing I needed to fly on to complete my list of Boeing jetliners except for the Boeing 720. This marks a milestone for my last Boeing Jet, and my last continent except Antarctica. The KLM flight was about 1 hour late departing due to a failed emergency battery, but the pilot was exceptionally communicative the entire time. The onboard experience was perfect; the staff were super friendly and attentive, the food was amazing, and the seat was very comfortable. I got chatting with the crew on the flight and was invited to explore the upper deck, galley;s, and crew rest area. The flight was very smooth as well; probably even smoother than flying on the Boeing 787 Dreamliner. It was a true joy flying on the Queen of the Skies!

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The plane parked on the tarmac upon our late arrival so we had to take a bus to the terminal. Once inside the terminal it was a quick walk to immigration/customs where I only had to wait about 15 minutes to get my passport stamped. It saves a ton of time if you have you e-visa beforehand. I just needed to get my fingerprints and photograph taken. After clearing immigration/customs I was met by my GoWay Travel representative named Justar. She’s a delightful young lady who moved to Nairobi two years ago after graduating with her bachelor of arts. She will be my tour guide in 2-days time.

Tomorrow is a day of relaxation and exploring the Central Business District of Nairobi. Make sure to check back tomorrow for my next blog post!

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2018-08-17 – Travelling to Kenya

Posted in Aviation, Photography, TravelTagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Today is the start of my long journey to Nairobi, Kenya. I worked from home in the morning before heading over to my parents house to have lunch with my mom. We went to one of our favorite restaurants, Filo’s, where my mom and I shared a delicious shrimp and mushroom pizza. I then did some more work until it was time to head to the airport.

My dad drove me to the airport at around 2:30pm, but it took nearly an hour due to traffic. I relaxed in the Air Canada lounge and had dinner and a beer before boarding my flight to Toronto. The flight was on a one month old Air Canada Boeing 737-MAX8. I took a few photos before boarding the flight, but as you can see the air quality is rather poor so it made for some rather hazy looking images. The interior on the MAX is substantially better than their Airbus A319/A320 aircraft, with one exception… the washroom. The new interior is very bright and open feeling, despite being 6” narrower than the Airbus A319/320 aircraft it is slated to replace. The seats are leather and extremely comfortable and adjustable. The entertainment system is excellent and has a large high resolution screen. The bathroom is pretty crampt, leaving little room for maneuverability and the sink is very small and sprays water all over you. I was also talking with the flight attendants and they said the galley is rather difficult to work in compared to the Airbus A319/A320 aircraft, which is too bad.

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I landed in Toronto and walked over to the Hilton Garden Inn hotel, which was only about 1km away. It was faster to walk than it was to take the shuttle. I’ll probably take the shuttle in the morning though.

I asked the hotel if I could have an extended stay as my flight tomorrow doesn’t leave until 6:30pm, and they agreed. The room is spacious and has a very comfortable King Bed which I will put to good use shortly. Check back tomorrow as I continue on my journey to Nairobi, where I will start on a 8 day Kenyan Safari before continuing onto Turkey, Greece, and Spain!

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