How to Pass Monkey Inspection

Our lady pilot - she was cool. The cockpit was so close I could practically reach inside from my seat.

Can you see the runway in the distance? Amazing! I took this shot from my seat.

Samburu

We flew from Nairobi on Friday April 22nd sometime around 10am. Nairobi was nice and quiet as it was a National holiday so we had the roads to ourselves.  We were setting of for our first family Safari, 3 days in Samburu about 6 hours drive north east of Nairobi.  In about one hour we'd flown there and arrived fresh and ready for animal spotting.

Samburu is particularly known for the Blue Legged Ostrich, Oryx, Reticulated Giraffe, Grevy's Zebra and probably some other animals that I am leaving off this list. So as soon as we jumped off the plane we were ready. 

 



Hilarious duty free shop on the runway at Samburu airstrip



Dad, mom and me in the safari van early one morning

weaver birds have made this tree a home - they make a new nest every year so lots of them are empty

We were lucky it rained mostly in the evening so the rivers were full in the morning but clear by the afternoon.  The colours in Samburu were beautiful deep, dark reds and browns.

Warthog in flight. My dad's favourite safari animal.  The Swahili word for Warthog is Pumba. Go Lion King.

We set off early one morning and were lucky to spot 3 cheetahs. They had collars around their necks, which wasn't the case in the Mara, but they tag them in Samburu because there are so few Cheetahs that the park rangers like to see their migration patterns and see where they go

Samburu was full of amazing little birds - thanks to Steve's camera I was able to capture some pretty good shots :)

The shadow of our safari van, early one morning

The Oryx

Yellow Starling I think this one is called. I don't know how they manage to not get stuck on one of those needles.  Looks dangerous territory to me!  Stinging Acacia trees are evil!



This is the vulturine ginneafowl. There were loads of them and they didn't look so vulture like to me.  They also liked hanging out in the trees



The other wonderful think about Samburu compared to the Mara is the landscape, my parents and I are big on landscapes so we were really pleased that between animal spottings we got to enjoy this amazing countryside!

So monkey inspection starts with baboons. First they like to sit on the bride. The do this only early in the morning before anything really gets moving. They make it know who is boss by staying in the road for as long as they can.  There's a border between the Buffalo Springs national park and the Samburu National Reserve just before this bridge, and they've painted some animals onto the wall to make it look pretty - turns out the baboons were scared for weeks because they'd painted a really big lion on the wall. How cute!  Baboon, however, are not so cute. They have blue bottoms and are generally pretty ugly.  They do flee inspection early in the morning too, just like the monkeys that you'll see in a bit.



Right - so here we go this is MONKEY INSPECTION  - baboon style. It's a rigours and thorough checking and picking process that involves finding flees, picking them out of the fur and getting rid of them one by one. No one seems to be embarrassed about this, so well done them in the name of personal hygiene! Baboons can take up any number of positions during flee inspection, on their stomachs, backs, on all fours, up a tree, the options are endless....



The Grevy's Zebra - they have a white belly, large ears and its stripes are narrower than other Zebras. These guys are only found in Ethiopia and Kenya so we were lucky to spot a few.  Unlike in the Mara these guys seem to travel alone, i think it's mostly because we only spotted males.  Not sure where the females and babies were hiding out. These guys are considered endangered because their population since the 70's has gone down from 15k to 3k, but the numbers have stabilised since 2008 so I am guessing that's a good thing.

This guy needs no introductions.

The Reticulated Giraffe! These guys seem to have larger, deeper coloured spots with thicker white lines between them compared to the Rothchild Giraffes we saw in the Mara. These guys are native to Northern Kenya, Somalia and southern Ethiopia.  They're great and we saw several of them, including one group of 5!

We went for a nature walk with some of the park rangers. Nature walk consisted of really random things, but most frequently pointed out and most noteworthy was how often these guys talked about dung. They loved examining dung, asking us what we thought the disposer of said poo had eaten, etc.  We saw some wild animals whilst we were off on our walk but nothing predatory, which I think was quite lucky, given earlier that same day we'd seen cheetahs, but not to worry, we're safe!

Weaver bird love birds

This little guy was hanging out outside our tent.  The monekys at Larsen's Camp were really cheeky and would try and get food from inside the tent in so many ways. We had to zip up our tent and also put our mat to cover the zippers as these little guys have learned how to open tents.  So cleaver!  Our waiter, who was assigned to us for our entire visit, would bring tea, coffee and cookies each morning.  Without fail, the monkeys would do anything they could to get in and grab some! 

Reticulated Giraffe

wonderful views of white capped Mt. Kenya one morning - not a cloud in the sky!

Departure day breakfast with Champagne, good bye Larsen's Camp we were so sad to leave!

Safari Van

Joshua, our wonderful driver who took care of us for all 3 days

The Samburu people who were there to welcome some people who had just arrived in Samburu on the day we were leaving. I love how close they get to the airplane.

When we departed Samburu we didn't have to show any ID or plane ticket to board the plane, they just let us get on.  It was like no other flight I've ever taken before. The flight landed on the runway and we threw our own luggage into the hold and jumped on.  Very cool. On the plane we met the same American family we'd seen on our way to Samburu. They'd gone to another camp.  Kenya can be a small world sometimes!

Final thoughts - Monkey Insepction - I love how this guy has his tail in the air and the ohter guy has his face in the little monkey's butt. too funny. This was taken right outside our tent.


 

Goodbye Larsen's Camp, we'll miss you!