When you think of Africa, you can’t help but also think of a safari. The word safari comes from the Swahili word of the same name, which came from the Arabic ‘Safar’ which means “journey.” And that’s what a safari ultimately is – an overland journey to see wildlife in their natural habitats. The quintessential African safari aims to see the so-called “Big Five” game animals of Africa – lion, leopard, rhinoceros, elephant, and Cape buffalo. These animals form an important part of the safari market, both for wildlife viewing and big-game hunting. Of course, I have to say that my “Big Five” are different in that the five animals I’d most want to see are the lion, giraffe, zebra, elephant, and rhinoceros. Given how elusive the leopard can be and how abundant zebra are, perhaps my five are more realistic, especially if you can’t get a weeks-long safari.
Our safari adventure was an abbreviated one, consisting only of a single day that began at 6:25am. My understanding is that “normal” safaris kick off well before this time in order to catch animals at sunrise, but our ship didn’t even arrive into port until 5am so a 3am wakeup call would have been a bit overboard for us. And then we had to do the 2-hour, 62-mile drive to the Tsavo East National Park – so we weren’t exactly going to hit the park at sunrise. It’s okay though. Knowing that we were going to be limited in our safari experience didn’t dampen our spirits at all. We were super excited for this adventure.
The drive to the safari was far from uneventful. We left the Mombasa port already in the vehicle we’d be doing the actual safari in. The vehicle seated six passengers and the driver (and could have held two more people). Ryan and I sat in the back and were pleased with how easy it was going to be to see our surroundings through the windows. Good thing we were already in an off-road vehicle, because we almost immediately went off road. Rather than stay on the highway, which was backed up with port traffic, we proceeded to wind our way through big semis, weaving in between them and into the ditch, over construction areas, and occasionally into the opposite lane to race forward before oncoming traffic came. We bumped and jostled around, an event that made me a tad nervous but one that Ryan found fun. We had moments where I wondered if we would be able to get back on the road once we got off it, but we always managed it. Our driver, David, was impressive to say the least. Of course, excitement aside, it was nice to see the African landscape as well as we wound our way to our destination. The villages that we drove through were sparse and quite rural. We saw people walking their children to schools that seemed to be in the middle of nowhere. We saw many buildings that seemed to be decorated with advertising for Safaricom – the local telecommunications provider. It was hard to tell if Safaricom provided building materials in exchange for advertising, as the exteriors of the buildings themselves all seemed to have some reference to the company. Ryan and I had prepared ourselves for the 2-hour drive by bringing an iPad along to play some games in addition to staring out the window and wound up only playing a single game of Ticket to Ride because the views and the drive itself sufficiently kept our attention.
We eventually arrived outside of Tsavo East for a brief rest stop before embarking on the safari. A quick stop at the bathroom (that was surprisingly modern and clean given its location) and a purchase of a Coke to give me a jolt of caffeine, and we were ready to go. We opted to wait on any souvenirs since we didn’t know what we might want at this point to remember. As Ryan said, we could wind up buying something that would just be a reminder of what we *didn’t* see if we got it ahead of time. After everybody was finished with the rest stop, we were off!
The combined area of Tsavo East and West National Parks makes Tsavo one of the world’s largest game sanctuaries. Situated about halfway between Nairobi and Mombasa, Tsavo East (where we went) spans 8,035 square miles, and is larger and more arid than Tsavo West. The vegetation in Tsavo East National Park consists of savannah grassland with thorny bushes, and some swampy marshland near the Voi River. The landscape is unique because of the Yatta Plateau formed by lava that oozed from Ol Doinyo Sabuk Mountain. The main river passing through this park is the Galana River.
We entered the park through the Bachuma Gate and began our safari. With the top of the safari vehicle now wide open, we were able to stand and see out above the roof as we moved along.
We immediately began our search for animals in the brush. And, almost immediately, we caught a glimpse of an elephant herd in the far-away distance. As we proceeded along, we also saw some Cape buffalo. The Cape buffalo is the largest and most common buffalo in Africa. They’re also the largest of the different subspecies of African buffalo, coming in at between 1,100 and 2,000 pounds. Another fun fact that makes it exciting that we saw them – they are known for their aggression and are sometimes called the “Mafia of the Bush”, “the Black Death”, and “the widowmaker” due to their dangerous nature. Cool, right?
At some point we made our way to the Aruba Dam, a popular, manmade watering hole that is among the best places to view and photograph the park’s resident game, particularly Tsavo’s famous herds of elephant. There were so many elephants! We saw some young males play fighting, which was fun. We also saw several baby elephants of increasingly smaller size. They were being guided and protected by the elder elephants – a real sight to see.
We continued along and saw some zebras grazing in the brush. Again, there were baby zebras that were cute to see. The animals were cautiously curious as we neared them, though they kept their distance. Fun tidbit about zebras is that each one is different in terms of its stripes. Much like a human’s fingerprints, the stripe pattern is unique to each zebra.
The elephants, zebras, and Cape buffalo were the main attractions for our safari. We also saw some gazelle, impalas, and antelope, as well as a hippo in the water (though that wasn’t particularly exciting as it was mostly submerged and had no intention of getting out of the water for our viewing pleasure).
Following our first safari, we proceeded to lunch at the Voi Safari Lodge, a splendid lodge perched on a hill overlooking a small watering hole. We had a buffet style lunch with a variety of food. I also tasted a local Kenyan beer – Tusker. It was a tasty, refreshing lager. We also did see a lizard in the camp area, so we’re counting that as another animal we saw on our safari. 😊
After lunch, we went on another game-viewing drive before exiting the park. We saw more of the same animals we saw on our way into the park – elephants, zebras, and gazelle. We didn’t stop as much to view the animals – just made our way to the park entrance. One last thing I’ll mention are the termite mounds we saw everywhere. They were huge, dotting the landscape and drawing our attention with their bright burnt sienna coloring. There were even some mounds that were encasing trees, to eventually smother the tree. As much as we are grossed out by insect mounds (or at least I am), they are essential components of the African ecosystem, enriching the soil and providing a vital food source for numerous creatures in the wild.
The drive was just as eventful on the way back to the pier, if not even more given the insanity of the trucks on the road. At one point we were squished between trucks in a way that made me wonder how we could possibly get out of the pinch – and yet David somehow maneuvered his way through the trucks to go in the ditch on the opposite side of the road to wind our way past the congestion.
And here are a few images of the village life that we viewed. The buildings were quite ramshackle and primitive in many ways.
And occasionally we’d pass more animals – goats, cows, stray dogs – along the road.
Ernest Hemingway wrote several fiction and nonfiction short stories and books about his adventures on African safaris. Perhaps this is the inspiration that will catapult my own writing career. It was certainly a memorable trip, despite not seeing giraffes or lions. People on this trip who have been on other safaris said that our experience was a good one and on par with other safaris they had been on in the past. So I feel good about our outing. Indeed, it was a journey to remember.