We got up early for the first day of the 3 day safari. Bridget, Hasith and Yu-Ching had booked (and paid for as it turned out) for their Masai Mara safari costing them about US$500 whilst we had paid US$285 for only a day less. Before they’d arrived the previous night we’d hoped they would have been able to cancel theirs and come with us but it wasn’t to be. In the end their minivan left with just the 3 of them and ours (we were expecting to have to join a larger group) left with just Bhav and I.
The roads in Kenya are rubbish, so it took us a long time to drive to our camp (situated about 1km from the main gate) and backed directly onto the National Park). We just had a few hours of our game drive that day.
The camp itself was quite nice. We had a twin bed tent to ourselves within 20m of the dining hall and toilets. There was hardly anyone else there too due to it being a short time after the migration which is the real attraction. That’s not to say animals weren’t still crossing from the Serengeti (in Tanzania) to the Masai Mara (in Kenya) across the river but just that they weren’t moving in huge numbers any more.
After a surprisingly good dinner we were treated to a short routine of traditional Masai “dancing” performed by the local Masai that also acted as guards to protect the camp against dangerous animals (I forgot to mention there was no fence either around the camp or the national park). I’d read about Masai dancing and how it was basically just jumping up and down and they were right. Unfortunately with there being only the 2 of us watching them around the camp fire they got us up too.
Home sweet home
The Masai herding their animals