The Big Five all seen in less than five hours

A good night’s sleep in our pleasant Nairobi hotel and we were all set for breakfast at 6.00a.m. before meeting our driver at 7.00a.m. to make our way to Ol Pejeta where we were to stop for two nights.

Chris was waiting for us promptly at 7.00, arriving in the lobby just as we did at about five to the hour. Our first stop was the office of our tour company – Spirit of Kenya – as we had to pay the balance of the cost of the trip, having decided it was more convenient to bring it with us than to do a bank transfer, so avoiding the various unexplained overseas fees that used to come with such transfers.

The journey to Ol Pejeta took about five hours in total, travelling through many small towns with thriving markets and the usual folk walking seemingly huge distances to undertake their daily tasks. In addition to the usual ‘comfort stop’ at a very expensive curio store which had exceptionally clean toilets, we had to go to a bank and a supermarket before finally arriving at Sweetwaters Ol Pejeta just before 1.

The rooms here are tents with all mod cons but ours is also raised to first floor level. The first thing we noticed was that the lounge and dining area overlooks a watering hole and just in the short time we were there we saw a variety of wildlife, including lots of birds – mainly ibis.

Lunch was good and, having caught our breath, we decided to have a coffee sitting where we could see the watering hole: we were in for a treat. A family of warthogs came to play, there were buffalo, waterbuck and impalas and then, from nowhere, through the clutch of crested cranes that were standing around minding their own business, strolled a rhino. He came straight towards us and headed straight for the pool.

We had arranged to meet Chris at 3.30 to go the Chimpanzee Conservation Centre and then for a game drive. Again, he was on time and ready to go, blinds rolled up and roof uo so that we had our open topped and open-sided vehicle: what a treat that was when it came to taking photos!

The Chimp Conservation Centre took chimpanzees from Uganda when they were endangered under Idi Amin’s regime. They have twenty in all and are determined to keep them all alive. we saw about eight of the ‘residents’ and it was a fun visit. We also bumped into a group of teenagers who became quite chatty. They were with a minister who asked where we were from and whether I was a Christian. As soon as I said ‘yes’ he wanted to know what church I belonged to and when I said I currently attended a Methodist Church he became really animated, declaring that this was a Methodist group and asking me to bring back to the church at home greetings from the church in Kenya.

Not far from the Centre we saw elephants wandering across the park so stopped to see if we could get any decent photos, then we found two male lions rolling around, resting in the shadows, possibly beginning to think about dinner.

As we left, Chris put his foot down. He had become a man with a mission; he had been told about cheetahs hunting not too far away. There were two quite young animals watching at a distance as a herd of gazelles made their way past nearby. They didn’t manage it today – but we may see them again.

We passed rhinos in the distance as we sped on to the cheetahs and, having left them, had another fast-is drive as the light began to fail because he had heard there was a leopard nearby. In fact there were two and although the light was too poor to get any worthwhile images, the sighting just brought the day to a fitting end.

Just time for dinner and an early night. Tomorrow will start all too soon….