FINALLY! I got myself out onto Lake Naivasha!!
We all decided to leave work a little early Friday afternoon to change and head down to the lake for an early evening boat safari in hopes of catching some hippos, birds and other wildlife activity before the sun set.
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| Mr. Wildebeest here was not scared of our car on the way in! |
Based on the advice of some earlier UWers, we headed down to rent a boat and guide for an hour tour. We haggled the price down to $25 for 5 of us, and boy was it worth it!
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| Our boat and excellent driver/guide |
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| Heading down to the water in our snazzy, subtle life jackets |
The lake was gorgeous, with a million different birds settling down for the night!
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| Hundreds of red knobbed coots speckled the water's surface |
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| Egrets abounded |
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| Funny little birds..jacard maybe? |
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A scrum of pelicans at sunset!
(I'm sure that's the right term) |
The lake has risen a lot in the past few years (despite horrible droughts? I don't totally understand it), and has left dead acacias and shallow swampy areas as a result. Luckily flamingos love the algae in the shallows!
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Lesser flamingos flapping away
Gotta love their hot pink wings! |
And cormorants love the dead trees--there had to be hundreds of them returning to this one area for the night.
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| Cormorants on every branch |
We did come upon a few herds/pods/solitary hippos, and kept our safe distance while giggling at their twitchy pink ears and nostrils. Only saw one old fellow half out of the water, and the rest stayed firmly submerged.
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| Show us your face!!! Alas he did not |
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| Little hippo heads--these are hard to spot! |
Mostly it was a lovely ride (in between rain storms!) that offered gorgeous views of the lake, Longonot, and the surrounding territory.
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| Mt Longonot |
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| Waterbuck enjoying the sunset |
Afterwards we heading further around the lake for a pizza dinner at one of our favorite muzungu spots to celebrate the Ob-Gyn resident's last night. We all made it to bed at a reasonable hour knowing we were leaving early for Nairobi the next morning.
A lovely Friday night!
[ I will re-post with group photos when I get them from the other girls! ]
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