The Amazing Maasai Mara (Vacation Days 7-10)
on A Serendipitous Journey (Kenya), 27/Oct/2009 16:13, 34 days ago
Mon Sep 21– Thurs Sep 24My very good friend Rosemary, owner ofMauve Holidays, personally came to meet us at Elsamere and accompany us en route to Narok where we met our safari vehicle. We spent the first two days of our safari with John in the“James Bond 007” mini bus and our second two days with Ratik in the luxurious brand new safari vehicle complete with a sound system, phone charger and even a mini refrigerator.John is a very boisterous man who my mom said didn’t stop talking from the moment we met him, until the moment he said goodbye (but in a good way:-). He was very knowledgeable, extremely entertaining and, although he is from the Lua tribe, he seemed to know nearly every Maasai in and around the game reserve.Ratik is a soft spoken but proud Maasai man who is also very knowledgeable and an amazing game tracker. (He did a special for the BBC whereby he tracked a leopard for an entire year.) When in his homeland, Ratik always dresses adorned with Maasai jewelry and draped in traditional brightly coloured Maasai cloth. He is proud of his roots and, despite his occasional life in the city, his ability to identify with and support his people. (He has an interesting story, which I've summarized at the end of this post)After a couple of hours on the road with John in the 007 van we arrived atOl Moran tented camp, just outside the gate of the famous Maasai Mara game reserve. It was much more luxurious than I had anticipated with spacious tents with cement and tiled floors, warm running water, immaculate washrooms with flushing toilets and even electricity during certain hours of the day. It has a large courtyard where baboons often visit in the mornings and a quaint outdoor dining room with stone walls.During our very first evening game drive with John we saw a pregnant female lioness, resting on the rocks after consuming a very large antelope (lions consume some 50 kg of meat per day according to John) and a large male lion asleep on his back with all 4 paws in the air. A giraffe stood as still as a statue some 50 feet away, hoping the lion wouldn’t notice him! These were the first of some 16 lions we would see over the next few days, including an entire pride of lions and lion cubs basking in the sun on a rock formation.I had been on asafari in the Maasai Mara back in December 2008however this trip proved to me that every safari, and every game drive for that matter, brings with it a totally new experience. One day we saw about 60 giraffes and dozens of elephants and the next day we saw none. During our 4 days in the Mara, we saw thousands of my favourite little Thomsons gazelles with their constantly wagging tails, tens of thousands of zebras and gnus (wildebeest), hundreds of Topis and hartebeest (named after the heart shape which their horns make), hundreds of water buffalo (the most dangerous animal in the Mara),dik diks (tiniest little antelope you will ever see!), hyenas, hippos, Maasai ostrich (with their bright pink necks and legs contrasting against their black and white feathered bodies), dozens of families of elephants and giraffes, 5 cheetahs and even several 3-tonne crocodiles!We were extremely fortunate during a game drive to witness the 7th natural wonder of the world, the wildebeest migration from the Maasai Mara in Kenya to the Serengeti in Tanzania across the Mara river. When they reach the river it’s a waiting game, as it's very dangerous for them to cross with 3 tonne crocodiles lurking in the river. You can almost hear the dialogue amongst them :“You go first!” “No way! Are you kidding?! I’ll be killed - if not by a croc, by you guys jumping on my back and trampling me to death!”… and so on (this is how we kept ourselves entertained from the safari car as we patiently awaited the crossing). :-) Eventually one brave, stupid or restless wildebeest takes the plunge and the moment that happens the rest follow. For better or for worse, although we saw a lurking 3 tonne crocodile approach as the final zebras and wildebeest were crossing, we didn’t witness a kill.Ratik’s story: Ratik is the only man in his family to receive an education and he has a leopard to thank for it. As a very young Maasai boy, he was responsible for watching his family’s herd of goats and sheep, when one night a leopard came and stole one. Ratik’s father was very upset with him andas punishment sent him to English school, saying he wasn't going to make a good Maasai warrior. Ratik quickly learned English and continued his studies through highschool, sometimes seeing it as a blessing and other times as a curse. As a young man, Ratik proved to his community that being educateddoes not hold you back from being a true Maasai warrior when he won a medal of honour by being the first of his peer group to spear a lion during a lion hunt.