July 20, 2007 – Kenya
We ate a late breakfast in the dining room and looked out onto the sunny plains. In the distance, we could spot Mt. Kenya and its very ragged top, whose highest peak is just shy 5,200 meters.
The birds had already been up for hours, but still had plenty to talk about. Despite all their noisy chatter, it was peaceful, and we realized we were now the lone guests at Ol Lentille. The Americans left early this morning, Giles returned home, and new guests wouldn’t arrive until late afternoon.
Sitting on our patio, we read books and articles and caught up on a bit of journal-writing. A little before lunch, we walked up to the pool. On the way, we heard the humming of wasps and looked down to see a new wasp nest that was forming inside a small nook of the rocky staircase. Even the wildlife is making itself at home in Ol Lentille.
The heat of the day was settling in and the three of us were happy to jump into the icy pool. Thanks to the joint efforts of Alex and Charly, I was unsuccessful at keeping my head dry. Hakuna matata…it was a very refreshing dip.
It was strange being the lone guests at lunch, but the staff told us it is not all that uncommon, as yearly occupancy is usually only about thirty percent, which doesn’t bode too well for profitability…
Beginning to feel like nomads, we packed up our bags after lunch – it was time to move on again. We drove to the “airport” – a narrow strip of gravel in the middle of miles and miles of wilderness. A tiny plane and lots of Masai spectators stood on the runway. The pilot walked up from his resting spot in the bushes. He loaded the bags, and we all hopped in. The plane was just big enough for four people and made me feel that much closer to the elements. And that much closer to hurtling into the bushes when the plane dropped a few feet with turbulence. I think we all tightened our seatbelts a bit :-)
We landed very smoothly on a small, gravel runway. At first, there was not a human in sight. We climbed out and were hit by a wave of sweltering heat. Despite the lack of overhead shade, it was reassuring to have a clear view of the runway in front of us. The wilderness behind us only made me think of hungry lions and large, moody elephants. As the pilot started to pack up, I was glad to see a few armed men in army attire walk towards us. It was a bit strange sitting beside armed camo guys on a runway in the middle of Kenya but at least we felt safe.
Soon, a car rolled up and two Masai men loaded our bags into the back. Our destination was the Il Ngwesi lodge, the first community-run lodge in Kenya. After half an hour in the car, dodging thorny bushes that whipped past, we wondered why our pilot hadn’t landed at the airstrip that lies next to Il Ngwesi. Then, I saw the ten-meter-long airstrip that ends at the foot of a hill. Very few pilots risk landing here.
Il Ngwesi literally means “wildlife people” and marks a shift in the Masai mindset… it was not so long ago that each young Masai man had to kill a lion in order to become an initiated warrior (which had its inevitable toll on the lion population). Now, the Il Ngwesi logo depicts a Masai warrior with his arm resting gently on a lion’s shoulder. The Masai people no longer kill lions except in self defense and at Il Ngwesi, the Masai have created a wildlife sanctuary.
After we placed our bags in our hut, we came to the pool area and talked with James, the lodge manager, about Il Ngwesi’s origins. As one of the few college-educated Masai in his community, James is very well respected. He laughed at his current position – lodge manager – because originally he was the most adamant opponent of having a lodge in his community. It took over 100 meetings and several visits to other lodges in adjacent countries before everyone in the community supported the project.
Il Ngwesi sits on the edge of the Mukogodo Hills and has six separate “bandas” (huts) with a maximum capacity of 16 guests. Each banda has a thatched roof, a semi circular back wall, a large platform/patio, an open-air shower, and a bathroom. Our banda faces a small valley. It feels very open and yet private – on the whole, it’s like being in a tree house.
As the sun started to set, we heard an elephant trumpeting in the valley. In the dimming light, we saw an elephant mother running back and forth with two small elephants trying to keep up. All around them, five or six smaller animals circled in. We were surprised that these smaller animals bore the characteristic black, yellow, and white blotches of wild dogs. Wild dogs are highly threatened and have been nearly driven to extinction by persecution, rabies, and habitat loss. They travel in packs of twelve to twenty and run very long distances—covering hundreds of miles each day. Most well known for eating their prey alive, wild dogs have incredible endurance and chase their prey to exhaustion and then grab bites out of the legs and torsos of the weakened animals. It’s easy to be disgusted by these creatures and their barbaric ways, but then again, everyone needs to eat dinner and it looks like tonight’s menu was baby elephant.
The best feature of our banda is the platform, where you can roll out the bed and sleep under the stars. By the time we came back from dinner, the elephants had quieted down, but other night sounds had taken their place. Frogs, owls, and monkeys filled the night air with song as we fell asleep with only a mosquito net between us and the clear night sky.
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