No Stopping for Lions (18 page)

After considerable discussion we decide that we can't pass the Ngorongoro Crater without visiting it. We've been to the crater once before and now we worry that we'll find it a crowded cartoon of what it was 30 years ago. In addition, we are now in the early days of the wet season and, although we've been assured that that means fewer people, it also makes the park roads boggy and impassable. In truth there's no avoiding Ngorongoro, as the road we must take to Arusha from Ndutu and the Serengeti climbs the south-western slopes of the crater then runs around the southern rim for a distance. Whenever the road passes close to the crater's ridge, visitors are able to snatch a tantalising preview of what lies below: a crater floor measuring 20 kilometres across, the world's largest intact, unflooded caldera. Even from up on the rim the large herds of animals it supports can be seen spread across its 200 square kilometres.

To take advantage of a little-used access road into the crater we book into the Sopa Lodge on the eastern side. This is perched on the ridge opposite most other hotels and we are hoping that it'll be a little less crowded over here. When we arrive we find busloads of package tourists, and at dinnertime the dining room is packed and noisy. I surprise myself by snapping at the man behind me in the buffet queue, and when we are charged US $25 for a lunch pack of little more than crackers and a boiled egg Neil is mightily annoyed and argues with staff, then management, to have this absurd charge reversed. After months of having to share our lives with no more than a handful of others we're finding this environment of big business and herded crowds hard to take.

In the morning the car park is packed with safari vehicles; it's a sardine tin of cameras, baseball caps and windcheaters. A sympathetic guide clears a way through for the Troopy and we escape, off down the escarpment. It's still early and there's hardly anyone about when we get to the crater floor, and the air is crisp and still. First off we spot one of the remaining big Ngorongoro tuskers mucking about in a secluded forest by himself, then a few zebras wander out of a gully. We see gazelles, hyenas and wildebeest and it's not long before the track in front of us is clogged with animals and we're forced to stop. By the riverbed a lion pride ambles from one sleeping spot to another and everywhere we see baby zebras, still wobbly on fluffy uncertain legs. Families of hyenas lie about in puddles, kori bustards strut their stuff, and a yellow-billed kite swoops down from the sky and takes Neil's sandwich out of his hand. It may be crowded and it may be trite, but it's still one of the greatest shows on earth.

En route to Nairobi we spend a night in Arusha. The town is bustling with importance since the UN's International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda set up shop in her centre, but where we stay, on a coffee plantation a little out of town, is peaceful and quiet. Very quiet, as their generator has broken down and no one seems to know how to fix it. In the dark we sit on the porch of our little chalet surrounded by a true English cottage garden, and later we dine by candlelight on the porch of the lodge's restaurant. It's dark and drizzling and not as romantic as it sounds.

David, our friend from Abercrombie & Kent, has booked us a room in his club for our time in Nairobi. It registers as we drive in to the pampered pink estate that this is Muthaiga Country Club, the home away from home for Karen Blixen, Denys Finch Hatton and a bookful of white Kenyans and associated hangers-on since it opened in the early 1900s. It was infamous as the playground of the Happy Valley set between the wars, and famous as the city bolthole of the Earl of Erroll, before he was shot dead by a jealous husband. It's a comfortable place of regulations and common values, where friendships are forged and reputations sometimes lost, and people know a good kedgeree when they see one. I study the goings-on at the bar, alert for secret liaisons and indiscreet behaviour, but there is no sign of mischief.

We're under David's generous wing and as well as showing us the sights of the city he fills us in on the gossip and intrigue of the white Kenyan population. It's a change to hear of accidental shootings, incompetent aristocrats and fallings out over polo ponies instead of political woes and the predicament of the black man in the street. We're getting an insight into another Africa, one a half step removed from poverty and corruption, and we're able to forget those for a few sunny days of scandal.

Roughly 150 kilometres north-west of Nairobi lies Lake Nakuru in the Great Rift Valley. The road to Lake Nakuru National Park passes along the escarpment of the valley, and judging by the wooden lookout points we see set up by the roadside stallholders, the views must be fantastic. But today there's a heavy mist blanketing everything and for much of the drive it's hard to see the road in front of us, let alone the valley below. Lake Nakuru itself is a Rift Valley soda lake and the algae it generates attract thousands of flamingos — we've been told ‘millions' — when the conditions are right. These, plus a healthy rhino population, are what we're hoping to see.

Naishi House is a stone English country cottage located in a shaded acacia woodland in the heart of the park. It belongs to the Kenya Wildlife Service and is usually booked out months in advance, but David has pulled a few strings. It has lawn-like grass and ivy on the walls, and smoke from the hot-water heater makes it look warm and inviting. This feeling is confirmed when Irene the caretaker comes out to welcome us. She is gracious and fun and between bouts of laughter she arranges for a ranger to guide us the following day.

Stanley the ranger comes out to find rhino and lions for us. He is a Methodist and engages Neil in a theological discussion about science versus Creation, whether Muslims believe in heaven and where our souls go when we sleep. I am on his side until he passes on the news that the place of a wife is to cook and clean and cut grass for her husband's cattle.

It's been a lionless morning when I see the telltale ears and twitching tail of a reclining pride. Stanley is excited and relieved and congratulates himself on bringing us to them, when Neil points out that they are in fact warthog. Stanley is not embarrassed but is blameful of Neil — ‘There is one in this car who is not a believer.' I agree. If Neil had really wanted them to be lions, as Stanley and I did, they would have been lions. Stanley has enjoyed himself very much and reluctantly gets out of the Troopy with a promise to pray for Neil, that he may come to his senses and give up the idea of becoming a Muslim.

In the park there are lots of white rhino, magnificent and huge and apparently happy to share their home with ogling tourists. One youngster who is barely a half-metre tall seems to have mistaken the Troopy for an admirably proportioned relative because he comes galloping towards us at full speed, a little grey barrel with a smile on his face. When his mother takes off after him Neil throws the Troopy in reverse and we beat a hasty retreat, forgetting for the minute that white rhinos rarely charge. We stop, they stop, then on they come again, and it finally occurs to us that the mother is just playing chasings, urging the little guy on to stretch his legs.

David has arranged for us to stay next with friends of his at their lovely old farmhouse on Lord Delamere's ranch, further up the Rift Valley. A succession of Lord Delameres has farmed in the valley for just over 100 years and at the estate's peak it covered 300 000 acres and employed hundreds of the local Mau. Currently held by the fifth Lord Delamere, it's still a formidable holding and the Delamere name continues to be prominent in the agricultural history of the country.

Neil and I arrive rather late in the day to be greeted by YoYo and Grahame, a bottle of rosé on ice by their side. Also there to meet us are several geese, five Jack Russells and Wellington the Rhodesian ridgeback. Wellie is still bearing scars from the night he was dragged off the front verandah by a leopard. The leopard was scared off by staff but they couldn't find Wellie, who had run away in panic. Hours later he was discovered a few kilometres away, weak and bleeding, and unable to breathe properly as the leopard had torn his throat. He was waiting at the end of the airstrip for his master to fly back to his side.

We spend the first evening with our hosts walking the fences and confiscating snares. Poaching for bushmeat is a huge problem, and the next morning we come across the filleted carcass of a gazelle quite near the house. We later dismantle more than a dozen snares in the space of an hour or two.

After a late lunch and a number of chilled rosé wines we decide to go for a spin in Grahame's plane. At the airstrip he is just starting on his pre-flight check when he jumps back from the plane in alarm, an arm over his face. Then we hear it, a low drone coming from the cockpit — it's as though the plane has started itself without us — and when Grahame shouts ‘
Bees!
' the situation becomes clear. Sometime during the night a swarm of bees snuck into the plane and they're now having a fine old time, buzzing about and wedging their way into any available space they can find. They form a solid block in the cockpit and are emerging by the dozens from the engine and the wingflaps. It sounds and looks as if the plane is about to lift off. Grahame has already phoned to the house for cans of Doom and we proceed to spray every accessible nook and cranny until we're confident not one bee remains buzzing. The bodies are swept out, Grahame completes his check and soon we're in the air, soaring above the lakes and old volcanic craters of the Rift Valley accompanied by the lone drone of a concealed survivor. When we reach Lake Nakuru Grahame dips and banks over Naishi House to attract Irene's attention, and I wave like mad.

We are still in bed when Grahame flies off to work early the next morning and, just as the sun comes up, he dips down low and loud over the house in farewell to YoYo. It's a sweeping, soaring goodbye, somehow personal even though the roar must be heard for miles around, and I can understand how Denys Finch Hatton captured Karen Blixen's heart.

It's a long drive today to reach our home for the next few days, a Maasai concession bordering Amboseli National Park. The only road we can take is back through the centre of Nairobi, and as we pass the university we get a flat tyre at the same time that we notice there's a graduation day celebration in progress. The highway is a busy one and Neil pulls onto the verge as best he can. Two young men immediately approach with offers to assist and they help me position the safety triangles so that oncoming vehicles don't ram into the back of us or, worse, run over Neil's legs as he's stretched out under the Troopy. Another man motions from the bus stop that he's available if needed, but there's really nothing anyone else can do so Neil declines all help. I stand at the back, waving off any cars that seem to be approaching too fast or too closely, and I notice other cars pulled over, all with flat tyres. There are four of us in total, but the Troopy appears to be the only one carrying a spare. The other drivers all stand about on the highway guarding their rear tails and making calls on dodgy mobiles for someone to come and get them out of there.

Thirty minutes later and we're back on the road. At the next intersection there are dozens of street vendors moving along the median strip and between vehicles, selling anything from jump leads to soccer jerseys. We stop for the lights and one ambitious chap with a broad smile has several types of hats for sale, all piled on top of each other on his head. Neil has a brilliant idea and we quickly agree to give the vendor the electric jug and hair dryer sitting in our glove box, still unused and still impractical. He could surely make a few bob on those. But he understands little English and appears confused by our gesture; he seems to think that we want to exchange these for a couple of hats. Or does he know that they are pretty useless items to the bulk of the population who have no need for a hair dryer? Other sellers have gathered around, curious to see what is going on, but they show great restraint and don't interfere. The traffic lights turn green and the cars in front are moving off. At the last minute our friend spots the cigarette lighter lead dangling from each appliance and their potential dawns on him. He accepts them with a big smile as we start to pull out, and we can see him in the side mirrors waving and calling out, ‘
Asante! Asante sana mzuri rafiki!
', ‘Thank you, good friend', and he waves so vigorously that his hats topple off his head while his friends laugh and laugh.

We arrive late in the afternoon at Porini Camp, located deep in the Selenkay Conservation Area bordering Amboseli National Park. This huge private reserve is owned by the Kisonko clan of the Maasai people and it is reputed to shelter a great diversity of wildlife. Amboseli is known for its elephant herds as well as its great views of Mount Kilimanjaro, just over the border in Tanzania, but there are plans afoot to downgrade it from a national park to a reserve, which will allow for limited use by humans. In effect this new arrangement means that the Maasai will be permitted to seasonally graze their cattle within the boundaries, something which is, in fact, already happening.

The Maasai we'd previously come across were children herding cattle and old ladies on the side of the road, so driving into camp to be met by a half-dozen Maasai warriors wearing
shukas
and jewellery, and leaning on tall thin spears is awesome, in the true sense of the word. Their welcome is formal but friendly and there's a definite sense that we are invited guests in their domain.

I drag Neil along to anywhere I can ogle the warriors. Smoothskinned and as lean as a bullrush, they are truly vain and exotic creatures. The spotter on an evening game drive spends most of the time looking at himself in the rear-view mirror and he isn't at all embarrassed to be seen doing so. Sexy too: a soft red
shuka
draped over the shoulders to expose a V of bare smooth back; a beaded bracelet slid over the wrist with fingers as slender and as fine as an artist's; a direct gaze with watchful eyes. They consider themselves to be the only true men on earth and I believe them, travelling companion excepted.

I'm keen to visit the Maasai's
enkang
, their homestead, a few kilometres from camp and Neil reluctantly agrees to come too. A handful of warriors are our escorts, and one who speaks a little English answers questions with reserve. I ask him why he doesn't have stretched earfuls of bright beaded jewellery and he responds snootily that he is educated. I'm beginning to see the dilemma for these proud young men: they are keen to embrace the modern world of wealth and opportunity, but are still deeply rooted in the conviction that they are a race apart and that their culture is vastly superior. In Arusha we came across an example of this split personality. We'd been directed to a carwash attached to a large modern hotel/casino complex and noticed that the Maasai watchmen there were much older and fatter than those normally employed as security guards. Oh no, we were told, these are the wealthy owners, and they sit around their city property every day in their red
shukas
and sandals just as they would sit around their homestead in the bush, watching for anything suspicious.

We arrive at the
enkang
and are greeted formally by the chief, a surprisingly small man compared with the others. He has a charismatic demeanour and magnetic eyes, and I'm sure he's flirting with me. We're relieved when he tells us that they will not try to sell us jewellery and trinkets, and that he will let us know when it's unacceptable to take photos. We're introduced to many women and more warriors, and all the while children in a mix of ragged traditional and Western clothes follow our progress shyly. Flies hang around their eyes and mouths but they seem not to notice. One little girl finally musters enough courage to touch Neil's hand and then sticks by him like a prize for the rest of our visit. There is evidence of cattle and their by-products everywhere: in the walls of the houses, in the calabashes of curdled milk, in the dung which we step in more than once. The whole place smells like a cross between a barnyard and an old yoghurt carton but it's homey, not unpleasant. Without understanding each other's language I learn from a mother who looks old but is probably in her late twenties that she is treating her sick baby with a herbal mixture, and so that I can appreciate it she rubs a little onto my arm with the same tenderness that she administers to her little boy. We leave with a farewell from the ladies, a half-hummed, half-sung chant that wafts and weaves in my mind and is still there when I wake late in the night.

We're slowly making our way to the resort town of Malindi on the east coast so we leave Porini and move on to Tsavo West National Park, further east and nudging the border with Tanzania. It too has good views of Kilimanjaro and is reputed to have prolific birdlife, but we've heard that game is sometimes hard to find in its vast acreage. The road in to Finch Hattons, our home for the next three days, deteriorates the closer we get and just a few kilometres out the track disappears under lakes of recent rain. The Troopy forges through and doesn't miss a beat, although my heart does once or twice. We finally arrive at the lodge's gate to hear the news that all day other four-wheel drivers have had to be pulled out of the mud. What a trusty warrior the Troopy is, and what exemplary driving on Neil's part.

There are hippos in the waterhole below our platformed tent at Finch Hattons. Most nights at sundown a mother pushes her baby under the platform to protect him from harm while she goes inland to graze. You can see him in the beam of the
askari
's torch, bewildered by the light but only slightly alarmed by the intrusion into his special place. He has scratches on his face and an open wound in his side so his mother is wise to shield him from attack by an aggressive male, or perhaps a hungry croc. During the night we can hear him grazing and more than once we wake when he knocks against our floor as he moves about.

After two game drives we discover that game in the park is, as predicted, thin on the ground and we take to sitting on our deck watching the goings-on in the waterhole below. One day when the hippos are being particularly photogenic I suggest to Neil that he goes over to the other side of the waterhole to take a photo looking back at the hippos, with me posing on the deck of our tent in the background.

Off he goes, then soon appears on the opposite bank. But in the time it has taken him to get over there a big croc has decided on a sun-baking session and has beached itself at the water's edge, out of sight to Neil. I wave and point; Neil waves back and moves towards where I'm indicating. The more I gesticulate, the further down the bank he goes, following what he thinks are my instructions. Only when he realises that I am looking more fraught than fashion model does he stop and cautiously look over the bank. My hero, he takes the photo anyway although the hippos aren't there anymore, having been scared away by the ruckus on the deck.

The road that we were recommended to take to Malindi is supposed to be good, a highway in fact, but it's busy and a long way round so we decide to take a shortcut through Tsavo East National Park. This goes well, but once we exit the park on the other side the road deteriorates to such an extent that progress is in fits and starts, over dips so deep that we don't see an excursion of small children crossing in the pit of one until we drive into it, and the motorbike in front of us disappears completely from view before zooming up and out the far side. Although the drive is slow and a little nerve-wracking for Neil, it's never tedious and we put this down to the fact that we've grown to be so relaxed, so free of outside concerns that we can find pleasure in the smallest things, and continually discovering what's just over the hill or behind that bush has become a sort of addiction. By now we have total faith in the Troopy and have no fear of breaking down or not getting through. Months ago we lost the feeling of having to get to a place by a certain time; we know we are self-sufficient and we've accepted the quirks of the satellite phone and GPS. We carry plenty of fuel, food and water, Neil can change a tyre in 30 minutes and a bed is a ladder away. We also know that we have enough money to get us out of anything and enough time to stay wherever our hearts desire. We can afford to live for the moment and have learnt to savour every one of them.

David has rented a house for us at Malindi to be used as a base and to garage the Troopy while we spend five days on the island of Lamu. The cottage is just like a comfy beach getaway anywhere in the world, but here we have the added benefit of staff to cook for us, to turn the fans on and close the windows when the heat descends, and to sweep the yard of leaves and to guard us from intruders. It's a novelty for us and I'm all at sea when it comes to telling Shadrack what we'd like to eat and when we'd like a cup of tea. Neil is more used to this and chats away, interspersing food preferences and timeframes with queries about Shadrack's life and family. Before long Shadrack has confided that his family is coming from their village to stay with him in his quarters for a few days of school holidays, without the knowledge of the owners — would we mind? One afternoon we return from an outing and as we drive through the gates there's Shadrack lying in the grass in the shade of a mango tree, wife leaning against his bent knees, two little ones sitting on his chest while another two hunt for beetles in the grass. As we roll past they all wave and laugh and Neil calls to Shadrack to stay there, we'll get our own tea. With just enough money for the fares to get here, their days are spent down on the beach or in the cool of the garden, and one day we come home to find little wet footprints leading from our pool to Shadrack's rooms in the garden.

Malindi itself is different to all expectations. I was anticipating a cosmopolitan, glamorous place something like Tangiers, while Neil thought we'd find beautiful sandy beaches and good restaurants. We should have learnt by now that no place in Africa is totally exotic nor wholly idyllic. What we find is a large, closed community of resident Italians, dirty beaches with flat surf, and many young Maasai men hawking their wares and their bodies. We are excited to find a cluster of
salumeria
and
panetteria
, but that elusive great seafood restaurant on the beach is nowhere to be found.

From Malindi we fly to Lamu, having left the Troopy under the watchful eye of Shadrack. Here too David has rented us a house, and it comes with a housekeeper and a cook, so ‘self-catering' takes on a whole new meaning. The house is in the little village of Shela Beach, about 3 kilometres from Lamu Town, and suits us well. It's very hot here, and the air is heavy with humidity and frangipani. Lamu Town is a World Heritage Site and the whole island is Swahili, very much like Zanzibar used to be, with narrow lanes, Arabic architecture and women in black. There are no vehicles on the island so donkeys are used for everything — apparently there are over 4000 here — and they appear to be treated well enough. We have a mosque next door and are woken at 5 a.m. by the morning call to prayers through a loudspeaker, and there's a stable below where donkeys bray to each other throughout the night. One night dogs and chickens join in as well. During the day our neighbours play some sort of frantic Arab music and the din from generators used by private homes during power failures is all around, but somehow it's still peaceful.

The main topic of conversation among locals is the blackouts, the frequency and length, and the inconvenience suffered. On the edge of Lamu Town we pass the source of the island's electricity, a mini power plant with a bank of four generators attended by many personnel. But at any given time three of the generators seem to be broken, in need of maintenance or new parts, and the fourth is left to run on a meagre supply of diesel because most of the supply is sold by staff on the black market as soon as it's delivered.

How many times have we witnessed the Africans' love of rhythm and dancing? It must sit in their souls and come as naturally as breathing. Walking through the narrow back streets of Lamu Town we hear drumming not too far off and getting closer. Around the corner come two young girls, happy and laughing, beating a basic rhythm on drums almost as big as themselves. A little fellow of three or four has attached himself to them and he follows on behind, hips grooving and plump little legs making the moves. A conga line of one.

At The Boma restaurant in Vic Falls we'd watched as a family completely forgot themselves and took over the celebrations of the table next to them. The group of business colleagues on that table had asked the band to play ‘Happy Birthday' and before the third line was sung the family was up, dancing and swinging, singing happy birthday to themselves, congratulating each other as well as the true birthday boy on the next table and enjoying the occasion so unselfconsciously that the whole restaurant followed suit, shouting requests to the band, while the business group tried valiantly to sing louder than the family and dance more wildly.

On the waterfront below our house is a hotel called Peponi's and its public bar is where everyone who lives in Shela congregates for sundowners. Believing ourselves to be eligible we ingratiate ourselves into this group, even though we can only speak one language and the conversations jump from Italian to French to Swahili. The regulars seem to be an eccentric lot. One glamorous and slightly grand British lady tells us she is a doctor and responsible for health matters in the village. She is due in Malindi shortly to perform an intricate operation on a sick child. We're later told that this is all in her head, she's just an expat running out of money. We share a table with the grand-daughter of Jomo Kenyatta, Kenya's founding father, and an Irish writer — a drunk — whose name I should remember but whose books neither Neil nor I have read. Princess Caroline of Monaco has a wonderful house around the corner and there's a beautiful French lady in a wheelchair who stays at a reserved distance from the clique. Made a paraplegic after a bad road accident in Paris twenty years ago, she has a contingent of young men to help her around and is rumoured to have a Maasai lover.

In Lamu Town we meet some more odd birds. There's the Australian–Englishman we have coffee with every morning who is always on the verge of leaving, but who in the meantime cadges beds from sympathetic expats. Then there's the Swahili guide who keeps popping up all over the place and hectoring Neil after we refused his offer to show us around town. But when it's time for us to leave, he's there at the jetty to wave us farewell and to wish us
salama sana
, ‘much peace'.