Not Quite Great Race Day 1

The Great Race has been an annual adventure throughout the United States over the past ten years. This year we are doubling down, and are vacationing in Africa before the rally.

We landed in Kenya on Monday, June 3rd. We were a little battle warn from two days of travel, but excited to be in Africa. As we drove through Nairobi toward Karin we drove along side the National Park. We were not on the road 10 minutes when we spotted our first glimpse of a giraffe snacking on the leaves of a tree. We continued on and the traffic was a bit heavy. It was 4:30pm, people were heading home. Along the roadside were people waiting for rides and walking toward their destinations. We were shocked to see baboons playing along that same section of road.

We arrived at Manzili House and were thrilled to be in Karin. Two years of planning and 20 hours on a plane, we were ready to get the adventure going. Manzili house was the perfect stop before going onto safari.

Tuesday morning we were all up early. Jet lag has our sleeping patterns off. We were back on a plane this time heading to Amboselli Reserve. Amboselli is in Eastern Kenya, and looks toward Mount Kilimanjaro. (Kilimanjaro was hidden by clouds when we arrived)

We will be on a small charter plane flying from lodge to lodge throughout our time in Kenya. This morning our pilot was able to fly low, so as we came into the reserve he showed us all kinds of animals including elephants, hippos, flamingos, wildebeest, and giraffes.

Flying over Amboselli reserve

We landed about 10 minutes later, and watched an ostrich go crazy as we were landing on a dirt airstrip.

Aside from the ostrich we saw warthogs, gazelle and wildebeest. We couldn’t believe we were already seeing so many animals.

We loaded up in the safari style Land Cruiser, and headed for the lodge. We must have stopped 10 times to look at giraffes, zebras, gazelle, more wildebeest, and more warthogs.

Giraffe on our way to Angama Amboselli

We weren’t even on our first game drive and we felt as if we had hit the jackpot. We hung around the lodge until late afternoon when we loaded back up in the truck. We were on our first game drive. We had not gone far when we spotted an elephant. The elephant was a ways away, but we were excited to see it. We saw more wildebeest, gazelle, and warthogs. The guide found the tracks of lions. We followed the tracks into the bush, and searched for a lion.

We couldn’t believe it, we found three! They were so tolerant of us. They sat and watched us, and then moved. We followed them around for a little over an hour.

We ended the day by going to a tower on the reserve to watch the sunset. We were lucky to have the resident elephant right there eating his dinner.

We could not have asked for a better day!

Tomorrow we are up early to find “Craig”, the super tusker elephant.