Arriving in Kenya

My first glimpse of Africa was red roads sprawling below me, obscured through a fine cloud layer while I sat on the window seat of a small aeroplane, cramped and tired after 30 hours of flying.

Customs was a slow process in a makeshift, temporary series of warehouses. Apparently the airport is being renovated. We got our visas approved, collected our bags, went to the bathroom in a Portaloo bus and waited outside for the Australian contingent of the trip to join us. Our drivers for the Nakuru side of the trip - Peter and Julius stood with us while the Aussies bought sim cards and called their children.

Almost two hours later we were still waiting on them, standing exhausted in the sun. The airport carpark provided good people watching and we didn't look completely out of place due to the extreme socio-economic diversity of everyone waiting on flights, although Nina pointed out we were the only white people there. One lady walked past us wearing a full length camo fabric skin-tight bodysuit, while another lady was dressed up to the nines with her cute daughter in a matching outfit and a tiny afro.

We finally got in the bus and headed out of Nairobi. The roads seemed good for a while and groups of people stared at us in the traffic. The attention, whether it was curiosity, friendliness or hostility was unnerving.

We drove past Kibera, the largest slum in Africa. I remembered it from the making of the Constant Gardener movie behind the scenes footage.

Kibera from the road

The roads quickly got worse. Lots of people just sat on the sides of the road, some waving at us. Like Bali, the road vendors never really ended through the countryside, making it hard to distinguish towns and natural features. Near some of these vendors our van's fan belt broke with a rattle. Our initial reaction was to timidly sit in the van, but soon four men were crowding in, helping Mixe our driver fix it. We relaxed when we realised they were all people just after a tip, and our van was soon fixed and rattling down the road.

Our driver fixing the van

We stopped at the top of the Rift Valley. The name alone echoed through my memories of old National Geographic articles, and I couldn't believe that I was here, in Africa, seeing what was right in front of me. Although fog and cloud filled it, the size was incredible. You could just make out some roads, running forever in a straight line. I hadn't even realised where the valley was or that we would be passing this natural wonder on the side of the road.

That's not the edge of the ocean - it's the edge of the valley

The clouds just obscure the roads below

Bringing my wonder back down to earth, we stopped at an American style diner at the top of the valley with 3 out of 4 toilets broken. We bought lollies and chips and kept going.

The vendors changed into clusters of painted buildings, huge ads in English covering entire pubs and all sorts of concrete shops. There were lots of different churches with painted messages on their roofs.

On the side of the road heading into the valley we saw zebras, gazelles, monkeys and baboons. We shrieked in excitement and made the driver stop so we could take photos.

The first zebras I saw

Our long drive soon came to an end and we arrived at Sunbird Lodge. The view opening up over the huge lounge, reception and bar was amazing. The lodge manager Isaac introduced himself and we got our room keys. Our accomodation was this private hut with draped mosquito nets and a hammock on the deck. After a quick buffet dinner we went straight to bed.

Sunbird Lodge

Our room