Camping in Naivasha

Last weekend we headed to Naivasha for a weekend of rock climbing, camping, and boating. It was great to get out of the city, breathe somewhat clean air, and see more of the country. Naivasha is about an hour and a half drive from Nairobi and we rented a car Friday evening and set out on our road trip adventure early Saturday morning. Along the drive we hit a great overlook for the rift valley, and it is gorgeous. We had great weather that day and could see what I guess is more than usual from the lookout. The lookouts can be a little terrifying to stand on, given that some are merely planks of wood somehow attached together and sticking out of the hillside above a major drop off. But, I guess they didn’t collapse on us while we were there, so that was good.

Because we don’t yet have our residency cards, once we arrived at the Hell’s Gate park entrance we spent a good 45 minutes trying to negotiate our way in for a residents fare. As usually occurs with price negotiations (or most anything for that matter) in Kenya, if you are persistent enough and don’t give up, you will eventually get what you want. And we did! Thanks to Anna (our friend from Manitoba) and Damian’s negotiation skills and patience, we ended up only paying $7 to enter the park instead of the listed $25, victory!

Once we arrived in the park, we met up with a mountaineering club that was climbing some of the rock cliffs surrounding the valley. They had ropes, harnesses, helmets, and all the appropriate rock climbing gear. Many of them were very experienced climbers so they were able to show the completely inexperienced me how to tackle the climb. I’m not really sure how tall the cliff was where we were climbing, but maybe somewhere between 30 and 60 feet? Anyway, I made is almost all the way to the top on my first try but had to quit because it started pouring down rain and rock climbing in the rain is a no go! I had been very afraid to try climbing, but realized that once you get started, you forget that you are actually climbing high above the ground and are much more focused on making the next strategic placement of your foot or hand to keep going.

Because it started pouring down rain, we had to give up on the rock climbing adventure early and also the afternoon hike we had planned to take into the Hell’s Gate Gorge. I’m looking forward to doing the hike next time since I heard that there are boiling mud springs and that the locals who take you on guided walks like to paint your faces with the mud. The rain continued to pour down all afternoon and while it was raining we did a short drive down the road to observe the scenery and various animals. We saw zebra, buffaloes, and a couple kinds of antelope looking animals. We had the end the drive early because the roads became too washed out for our little Toyota car. But, the rain did finally let up enough that we were able to get to our campsite and get everything set up without getting wet. It did, however, ruin our plan to roast hot dogs over the fire for dinner. But, thankfully, the campground had a nice restaurant at it with some of the best food I’ve had since I arrived.

Right before we went to bed, we went looking for the hippos that are supposed to climb out of the water and come right up to the fence (the barbed wire fence that surrounds the campground so that they don’t come all the way up and trample the campers while they are sleeping). But, the drought here has caused the water in the lake to recede so far out and has created these mud swamps that the hippos get stuck in, so the hippos didn’t make an appearance. It’s actually quite sad that the hippos are getting stuck in the mud. I guess there was an article about it last week that mentioned how all the hippos are getting stuck and the locals are killing them (and I think eating them?). Anyway, it was one of my first experiences actually witnessing how little water is here in Kenya and it was really eye opening.

We successfully made it through the night without getting wet (yay new REI tent) or getting attacked by hippos or having monkeys break into our tents. The following day we took a boat ride out on the lake and walked down the long muddy makeshift path to get to the boat because the boat dock ended at least 50 or 60 feet before you hit the water. After the dock was this interesting path of boards, cut down plants and empty grounded boats to help you navigate around this awful mud that I swear would swallow you whole if you missed a step.

The boat ride was great, we saw the hippos (finally) and pelicans, flamingos, heron, and many other birds. We bought fish from local fisherman out on the water and had our boat driver whistle and call eagles out of the trees to swoop down and pick up the fish from the water right next to the boat. It was an amazing sight and I know Brandon (Mr. “I can’t miss the birds of prey exhibit” every time we go to a zoo or aquarium) will be very jealous.

Well, that’s the update on the weekend adventures for now!