October 21st, 2006 Nairobi, Kenya

October 21, 2006
Nairobi, Kenya

Hello rafiki’s (friends)!

This morning I woke up at about 8:30 and chilled out for a while (waiting for B to get up). At about 10:00 we headed downstairs for breakfast. Though it was $5 (very expensive for Kenya), it was quite good and included lots of fruit.

After breakfast we asked a cab driver to take us to the Elephant Orphanage (I heard about it on the travel channel). Instead of taking us to the elephant orphanage he took us to the animal orphanage. Not knowing the difference, we paid our entrance fee and got a tour of the facilities. It was a great mistake! We saw warthogs, cheetahs, lions, hyenas, monkeys, baboons, antelope, and crocodiles. All of which were orphaned when they were young and would not have survived in the wild.


Once we realized that we were not at the correct location he hustled through the park and back to our driver. We informed him that he took us to the wrong place and that we wanted to go see the elephants. After making us pay an extra 1000 shillings (about $15), he took us. We asked him to hurry because it was already 11:20 and the orphange is only open from 11:00 – 12:00!

We arrived at the orphanage at about 11:35. The next 25 minutes were spectacular. We watched the baby elephants eat, play in the water, and kick a soccer ball around. We also got to pet them (briefly). There was even an elephant that was only 7 weeks old (younger than our trip so far!). The workers then told us how the baby elephants need 24 hour care (they eat every 3 hours) and how they sleep in the same area as the elephants.


After purchasing a model elephant at the gift shop we asked our driver to take us back to the animal orphanage. We visited their gift shop and purchased safari hats (to protect me from the sun mom)! Ohh and I can’t forget to mention that I was highly amused by the traffic signs at the park…

We arrived back at our hotel at about 13:00 and made a trip to the ATM (we have a large payment due before we leave on our safari). After getting money, we decided to get some lunch. Every place we went to was serving the same thing fried chicken, french-fries, and burgers (we also had this meal yesterday for lunch and dinner).

On the way home B stopped and purchased some cheap DVD’s. When we got back to our room we collapsed onto the sofa and watched Die Hard (a little better Stu?).

The rest of the evening will be spent packing up our things and making sure that we have everything in order for our 7:00am safari departure. We will be gone for 13 days and will first travel to Masi Mara. We will then venture into Tanzania and onto the Serengeti. On our way back to Nairobi we will stop at the base of Mt. Kilimanjaro for an evening.

This may be the last post for a while but please check back as I will update if I can!