Kenya
Chapter four
A family of lions and a pond of hippos.
This morning Francis meets me at 0630 to start our drive. The sun rose behind us as we drove west and after a bit we stopped. Francis pulled out his binoculars and then drove forward and around a small mound where a young lion was perched. Soon we saw an entire brood, with small cubs following the adolescents as they played and walked in the golden grass.
Francis followed them and then drove ahead, predicting their path. His predictions were accurate. They walked straight towards us, the young lions tussling amongst themselves as the cubs struggled to keep up.
At one point a lion pounced. It had caught a rabbit and we heard its squeal as the lion pounced again and held it between its paws. After killing it it took the carcass to the trees to feed. A sibling, perhaps alerted by the rabbit’s cries, came for a taste but the first lion shielded its kill with its body, turning away from the second before settling down to its snack.
The second lion saw an opportunity and ripped the body away, leaving the head to the first, and walked away with its triumph.
I could hardly believe my good fortune to witness this.
We drove on and soon saw a small herd of land rovers. Zebra and impala grazed on the plain. Francis pulled out his binoculars and said there were cheetah. Let’s see if they make a plan, he said. He drove to the far side of the grass, with the prey between the cheetah and us and we waited. The zebra spooked and ran away. The cheetah waited.
Francis started the Land Rover and drove back around the grass trying to predict their next plan of attack. The cheetah seemed to have wandered away.
We ate breakfast by the grassland, keeping an eye on the cheetah. At one point a small group of animals stared them down and gave off shows of their strength and youth. They wandered off to rest in the shade of a nearby tree. A herd of wildebeest grazed nearby. Perhaps they were the next target.
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We finished breakfast and drove up to where they were resting. A large group of vehicles had arrived. We drove a bit away and decided to wait a while longer to see what would develop. The wildebeest, perhaps catching wind of the cheetah ran down field and reassembled. The cheetah wandered lazily. The wildebeest moved again. I said it was somewhat morbid, everyone gathered around hoping one of the wildebeest die. No one roots for the wildebeest, Francis said.
It rained in the afternoon afternoon. I sat on the porch for a while listening to the rain and looked up to see a warthog walking by across the river. I had taken a nap in a hammock after lunch. It was too cold to swim so I took to the tent to edit some photos just as the sky darkened and the rain began. Thankfully, it ended before my afternoon drive but the clouds lingered, filtering the light and providing a beautiful background for photography.
Francis picked me up and e drove out of camp, passing an elephant skull and a family of warthog.
We came to a fork in the road and he said there were two more animals on his list: the leopard and the hippo. The hippo were guaranteed but the leopard relied on luck. One path led to one and the other the other. We could only take one.
I asked Francis if he felt lucky. He said he hadn’t heard chatter about the leopard. We decided on hippos. If we heard anything we could change tack.
The hippo were amazing. A huge group lay in the middle of the river, sometimes snapping at one another, mostly content to wallow in the depths. The light was fantastic, the location serene. At one point Francis asked if we should continue. Else we could stay here all day he said. I concurred.
Before we left, I asked Francis if I could take his photo. He agreed and arranged himself by the hippo pond. In the photo he stands regally, wrapped in his red robe.
As we started to drive away Francis stopped the truck. He spotted a pair of lioness across the river far in the brush. We sat and watched as a cub appeared and jumped on its mom. Francis tried for a photograph with the phone through the binoculars but the cub vanished.
On the way back we paused to watch giraffe graze. A storm loomed on the horizon. The dark clouds signaling heavy rains.
Francis got us back just as the rain began and I managed to duck into the tent before the heavy rains began. I lay in bed looking at photos and listened to the rain. Once again it almost let up just before I had to leave for dinner.
After my meal I was offered a glass of wine. I had held out till not but felt that I needed to toast the Mara and all it had offered. And just as it arrived the sound of hyena laughing came from across the river. The staff told me they thought they had brought down a zebra and were about to feed. They had heard the zebra cry. 🇰🇪
