Super LEEDS in Kenya 2012

[samburumags]

Hey Leeds, that is really interesting, what a great place, you watch all the STers will be booking it before long,! I would miss the big cats but the countryside looks superb, glad you had a great time. Hope there is more reading to come

[Game Warden]

Did you leave one of Tony Park's books in that little library?

[Super LEEDS]

Thanks, mags! I really recommend Kigio, especially if its empty

 

Nope, GW. Wish I had had a Jim Corbett on me though.

[Orca Fan]

This is a fun read SuperL. Looking forward to more!

[Atravelynn]

Thanks for the boat and island tour info. No need to investigate pic times. Your estimates are what I was interested in. Nice spotting on the Lovebirds! Interesting background info from Inyathi.

[PT123]

Really enjoying this a lot. Thanks for the in depth review of Kigio. I've never heard of this reserve and am quite interested. Great luck with two caracals (now you're two up on me)!

[pault]

Good reporting! There is a wealth of useless detail here - perfect, if you can keep it up. Kigio sounds like a place with the right idea and a better solution for a community than trying to grow roses. Might R. Branson or lackeys have a hand in there if Virgin provide a lot of the guests? I can imagine I'll visit there in the future.

 

Shoe mystery solution... high water mark of a flood?

 

You're still such a sissy about the bugs. You need to be photographing and identifying them rather than torturing them with online video games! They had a mosquito net didn't they?

 

I personally think two big plates of curry forllowed by two big fat caracal sightings might have had more to do with the lack of sleep than the Malarone, although it does make me a bit restless sometimes. Do you take it in the morning with breakfast? I wouldn't take any medicine in the afternoon or evening (at my age, you can add ....and don't get me started about cheese.... )

 

Love those tree hyraxes - wonderful bush sound, and it is so funny when you know what cute little creature is making the noise.Not sure if I would want one on the roof though.

[Super LEEDS]

Thanks, Orca Fan and PT!

 

I was hoping to add at least the full day at Kigio before leaving on my trek to the pristine concrete forests of Barcelona but it looks like I may not get chance unless I can squeeze it in today.

 

Shoe mystery solution... high water mark of a flood?

 

You're still such a sissy about the bugs. You need to be photographing and identifying them rather than torturing them with online video games! They had a mosquito net didn't they?

 

I personally think two big plates of curry forllowed by two big fat caracal sightings might have had more to do with the lack of sleep than the Malarone, although it does make me a bit restless sometimes. Do you take it in the morning with breakfast? I wouldn't take any medicine in the afternoon or evening (at my age, you can add ....and don't get me started about cheese.... )

 

I think the shoe is from the limping jackal - explains the limp.

 

I'm not a sissy as such, I just hate bugs. I know you're gonna say "hate stems from fear which stems from ignorance" but I'm not having that, I just hate them. Either way, I survived and I'm probably making more of it that actually happened you're right, I wish I had taken a pic now, especially of this white thing that was stuck to the mirror in the morning. I guessed it was some kind of cocoon.

 

No mosquito net - they could put one up if needed but we didn't bother. We weren't bothered at all by any creepy-crawlies in bed to be fair [i may contradict this later], its just I have such sharp game spotting eyes, I tend to see them everywhere.

 

You're right with the Malerone. I was taking them too late in the day and stopped so I could start taking them in the morning. I don't think you're right with the curry though - the portions were not big at Kigio (just right) so I don't think it was that since I gorged myself later in the trip and was fine plus having grown up on the stuff, I'm pretty used to the 'side-effects'!

[pault]

Limping jackal! That'll teach me to be serious for a change!

 

I'm not a sissy as such, I just hate bugs. I know you're gonna say "hate stems from fear which stems from ignorance" but I'm not having that, I just hate them. Either way, I survived and I'm probably making more of it that actually happened you're right, I wish I had taken a pic now, especially of this white thing that was stuck to the mirror in the morning. I guessed it was some kind of cocoon.

 

Well, we can call it pusillanimous, if you prefer. Photgraphing them will help I bet (not with the mosquitos though!) or perhaps you need to adopt a couple as pets - give them names like Emily and Rajeev..

 

Okay, curry diagnosis was wrong. Good, as Indian-style curries are pretty good (and interesting) in Kenya - although I am not an expert on them.

Edited July 17, 2012 by pault

[Super LEEDS]

I am an expert and the curries in Kenya, on the whole, are amazing. I put it down to the extremely large and similarly influential Punjabi (Sikh) community. There was a restaurant called Sher-E-Punjab at our beach hotel last year where the Kenyan (indigenous) chef had actually been shipped to Punjab for 2 years to learn cooking - man that place was amazing. We forgo our All Inclusive (free) dining and ate there most nights queue comparing a lamb and spinach dish with the sighting of 2 caracals!

Edited July 17, 2012 by Super LEEDS

[Sangeeta]

I am trying to envision a 6 foot 3 SuperLeeds heading for the hills at the sight of a centipede :D

 

Mind you, in our home, I am the official escorter of all creepy crawlies outside the door while my 6 foot plus husband stays safely out of sight in the other room, occasionally asking 'Has it gone? Has it gone?'

 

Great reading so far. See, you have us waiting impatiently for the next installment!

Edited July 17, 2012 by Sangeeta

[Sangeeta]

Oh yeah, whatever happened to your safari duffle? I see some pretty hefty suitcases here, so you can't blame it all on the wife

[pault]

Oh yeah, whatever happened to your safari duffle? I see some pretty hefty suitcases here, so you can't blame it all on the wife

 

I see the same thing, but based on positioning of the bags would bet on the opposite conclusion......

[Super LEEDS]

There is a wealth of useless detail here

 

Thanks, Paul

Edited July 17, 2012 by Super LEEDS

[Super LEEDS]

Oh yeah, whatever happened to your safari duffle? I see some pretty hefty suitcases here, so you can't blame it all on the wife

 

I said I don't want any hassle over this I was going to say at the end that... erm... we over packed. We were young, it was our first ever total safari kind of holiday and having your own jeep for the entirety meant we had no worries about luggage restrictions. Needless to say, lesson learnt, we'll each be taking a small carrier bag each next time.

[Super LEEDS]

June 23rd - 24th: Kigio Conservancy

 

It was freezing this morning! Nevertheless, got out of bed to open the curtains and enjoy the view whilst listening to the chorus of birds and zebra.

 

 

Following our training from George the previous day, the wife spotted quite a large hyaena print outside our room. It was evidently a little old, perhaps when they had the heavy rains the previous week, but combined with the leopard we heard last night and giraffe tracks too, it was clear the animals really do roam everywhere here.

 

The room but one from ours was being refurbed due to the guests coming in. It seems they go over each room whenever new guests are going to be using it since we say them doing a lot of touch-up work, here and there. I asked the guys if it was OK for us to snap them

 

 

We eventually made it to breakfast where I spotted something across the river. It wasn't moving much so hard to distinguish but then realised it was a Syke's monkey that soon disappeared. The trees closer to us soon started to move and we were lucky to witness a river crossing of around 50 monkeys who were jumping on to trees on our side. They were in all shapes and sizes; the smaller obviously being the biggest draw.

 

 

We met the manager, David, a white guy from South Africa, who actually lives on the conservancy. He confirmed that a big male leopard had walked through 'camp' the previous night and was a regular visitor. He told us a story of how he found a track one day that neither he nor his guides could work out. It happened he met a friend who used to work on the conservancy around 10 years ago and told him he saw, only once, what made those tracks: a Golden Cat. I wasn't as read up on this cat as I could have been so perhaps wasn't as surprised as i could have been - David said they shouldn't be here but they are.

 

Reading up now, it says the cat normally lives in rainforests of west and central Africa, as well as in Kenya.

 

The plan today was walking so off we went with George, covering 3.5 miles over 4 hours in the morning, we walked to Kigio Camp and back, talking the long, scenic route. My journal says "nothing different really [in terms of game]. Still awesome". On the way back from Kigio Camp, the landscape was extremely bushy, green and tall. We walked along the river, trying to spy on some hippos that never turned up, all the way expecting to run into some buffalo whose droppings and tracks we encountered, but they didn't show either.

 

 

We were able to get up close to a large family of Rothschild giraffe with youngsters which was pretty cool, for the want of a better phrase. George told us we would normally be able to get a lot closer but they recently under went a game capture where around 5 giraffe were taken away by the KWS to the Nairobi Giraffe Centre so these guys were a little wary of people. David told us they would normally come up to the dining area during the day to be close to people too which would have been 'pretty cool' but he reckoned they were a few weeks away from that level of comfortableness again.

 

 

Anything for signal

 

 

I kind of preferred Kigio Camp since some of the walls were canvas and the view was much better, with a clear look of the river. The rooms were pretty similar other than that though, overall.

 

 

Kigio Camp has an outdoor dining area which overlooks the river and also a very large colony of bee-eaters. Unfortunately they were all out being the middle of the day but there were a few around.

 

 

We were back in perfect time for lunch. And the menu was even more perfect, eh, Paul?

 

 

A little relaxation was in order and also some time to check for wear-and-tear

 

 

After a little rest, we were asking George what we could do before the PM walk. Another trip to the bridge was in order but short lived as it didn't hold the same interest as yesterday so we took a little walk through some very dense bush towards a half-built hippo viewing platform that the manager is intending to allow guests to use, whilst sipping on something nice, perhaps. No hippos again but we didn't have a very close encounter with one of the Sykes monkeys.

 

 

The PM walk was somewhat shorter with us covering 2 miles in just over an hour but we had a great time, getting close to large herds of game like eland, zebra and waterbuck

 

[Super LEEDS]

Another fantastic walk

 

We were joined in the conservancy today by 4 German guests who come to Kigio each year. They were only here for 1 night and they opted for a walk with their naturalist, Stephen (the motorcyclist) but decided not to do the night drive. Maybe the $55 price tag kept them away. I wonder if they rued the decision.

 

 

During dinner we heard a very loud hippo sound coming from towards the river we were scouring all day. On shining my torch, I could make out something large and grey moving around: pumba! Even if it was big for a warthog, it wasn't that big....

 

Then, we heard another noise..... no not a hippo, not a golden cat, not even a tree hyrax but people singing and the clanging of metal. The team had gotten together to sign the "Jambo Bwana" song we presumed for the birthday of one of the German guests but alas...

 

 

The cake was delicious and we shared with everyone: Germans, Kenyans and all. What a fantastic surprise and not all embarrassing well a little

 

Fun aside, we had a mission to complete: see our fist chui on African soil!

 

The night drive didn't start as spectacularly as yesterday and we didn't see anything for quite a while. We did start to see the plains game and the odd cape hare but nothing 'different'. I blamed the half moon which was very bright - telling everyone I'd read night drives were better when there was no moon, requesting if they knew a witch doctor, to send him an sms to see if he could help. After about 30 mins clouds covered the moon and things start happening.

 

We encountered 2 spotted hyaena on the prowl and very focussed on something; they paid us no attention whatsoever.

 

 

We watched them a little while before I decided not to follow them since they were heading toward a large heard of impala that were mostly sat on the ground. Our lights would only help the hyaena, unfairly. Then we ran into a quiet patch again but I was happy that we had at least see fisi so I thought sawa sawa, let's go. Almost back in camp, I was just checking the battery on my torch when the wife said (not shouted) but calmly said "leopard". Internally, I heard myself say "yeah right, thanks", but then George said it too!!

 

 

I think we got better video footage but we spent around 10 minutes with the beautiful cat that became really relaxed. After a short while, it began to call whilst melting into the bush and we were left for a further 10 minutes just listening my guess was that perhaps this was a female as it was slight in build, and she was looking for the male we heard close to camp the previous night. My wife claimed credit for this, of course.

 

WOW, what a drive, what a day.

 

With smiles all round, we went off to sleep. No malerone or tree hyrax meant a slightly better night's sleep

 

The morning was again really cold but our moods were more dampened by the fact we had to leave this fantastic place, the fantastic people, the fantastic animals. Breakfast was a quick affair and Patrick was already waiting for us. Daft to say this but saying good bye was a sombre affair.

 

Even the giraffe gave us a guard of honour

 

 

On to Lake Nakuru! (when I get back from Barcelona)

[Orca Fan]

Great stuff!

[twaffle]

You don't need to go to Barcelona, truly SLs you need to continue. Your socks look just like my husband's!

 

This seems to wonderfully restful start to a safari. The cake was a nice touch by the staff.

[samburumags]

What a stunning place! The leopard must have been the icing on the cake. Talking of cakes I had one very similar in the Mara and they are delicious. I love a good Jambo!!

[Super LEEDS]

You're right, twaffle. It's far too hot why did i come?! Still, nice Punjabi restaurant 2 blocks away.

[Patty]

Nice to hear a report about Kigio!

[Lion Fanatic]

"Holy Socks...Batman!!"

[Super LEEDS]

Word up, LF. If you take anything from this report, take an extra pair of socks.

[Shreyas]

Just catching up on your TR. Very entertaining and informative. Waiting for more!