HIGHTLIGHT OF THE DAY: Eating copious amounts of meat
BUMMER OF THE DAY: Saying good bye to new friends
BUYS OF THE DAY: Goods bought at the Masai markets
WORD OF THE DAY: I’m going to miss you
CAMP SITE RANKING: Back at the Kivi Hotel in Nairobi – better than any camp site has to get full marks 5 out of 5 stars
Well the last 2 days have just been travel days to haul our arses back to Nairobi. Today is Monday; we left Jinga on Saturday and drove through to Eldoret for the night. Nothing to eventful, the usual 300km drive, lunch by the road, 8 hour drive on dodgy roads arriving into Eldoret around 4pm. We were back at the same camp we stayed in our first night and the weather has really changed and is overcast and a little cold. This was the freezer we stayed in last time, but this time I am prepared and have an arm full of clothes to put on when I go to bed, and I think the most crucial part is to close the god damn windows this time to try and trap some of that warmth. Paps and Em upgraded here and paid an extra 100USD to sleep in the same suite that Bill Gates slept in when he was here in 2009. They also were good enough to run some tours through their pad for the night, to show off they had a king size bed, hot water bottles, fresh towels and an ensuite. It looked magic the lucky buggers. It was their honeymoon, so it was also justified in their defence. To stay in the suite next door, with no claim to fame was 40USD cheaper which Mary and Pete were happy to pay, as it was their last night after being on the 60 day Cape Town to Nairobi trip. It was here I also got my first decent shower in like 10 days. The water was tepid (not freezing is a bonus) and I was able to finally shave my legs! Sounds so trivial but with the showers I have had have either been too cold or tap access only and I have had this massive scratch / scab thing on my leg the size of an eggplant on my shin since I fell over at Lake Bunyonyi. I feel half human again.
Back on the road at 6.30am the next morning, which in turn means a 5 something am wakeup. This is the last time I will roll this particular tent up and also the last time I will be sleeping on my own, I will pick up a new tentie when we start the next section of the tour tomorrow which will be welcomed with open arms. Even though you have all that extra room, it is nice to have a tentie. Another drive day. We wanted to leave a little earlier so we got back to Nairobi earlier to give us some time to get to the giraffe center and then to finish at the Masai markets. After a couple of ‘toilet’ stops we arrived back into the big smoke of Nairobi at 12.30pm. Not too many good-byes said at this stage, as we were heading to Carnivore’s for dinner. So we pretty much had to unpack all our gear off the truck and get checked in for our night in a hotel! It is amazing when you have lockers, overhead bins and massive seat pockets how much shit one can accumulate in 16 days. I looked well and truly like a bag lady, seriously, I had like 7 bags I had to get off the truck and up to the room. I think I may have to do some re-arranging later on tonight. In my defence I wasn’t the only one. Goodbye sweet truck – you were an awesome beast!
Goodbye Jools you were an awesome guide – goodbye Chris for your awesome driving – and finally goodbye Liz you’re cooking from what facilities you had was awesome and tasty!!!!
But no time for that now, as we had our pre-departure meeting at 6pm and we wanted to get out to the giraffe sanctuary to see if we could feed one. We had 6 of us, so we needed to taxis and we agreed on a price of 4000 (40USD) shillings for each taxi, to take us the 30 minutes out, they wait for us and then the return journey to get dropped back into town, but at the markets. We arrived and paid the 700 shillings (7USD) to get in and it was quite busy. There was one giraffe about 15m away from the feeding platform and the rest were at the end of the paddock. Sean and Lisa went to get some pellets to feed them and came back and said that they are all so far away because it was a week-end; they were quite full from people feeding them already and they really couldn’t give a toss about the food. Crap. There were a few keepers in the paddock trying to move the giraffes up to the feeding platform and I am not sure if I was happy with their methods. They started with a branch of fresh leaves, which got the first ones attention, but every time he reached for them he would pull them away, trying to coax him closer. He moved maybe 2m in the 20 minutes with the this method. Next was to get a bucket of pellets and was shaking them and calling his name, which was fine, until he started to throw the pellets at his head to get him to move. Yeah not sure if this was acceptable. In the meantime there was a keeper in the back paddock trying to get the others to move up also throwing pellets at them. He was successful with one, Laura, but she also stopped around 10m from the feeding platform as well. We waited maybe another 20 minutes and there was no movement from either giraffe, so we got some great photos and resigned ourselves to the fact that they weren’t going to be feed. So we walked out the front entrance, and I am not sure who looked back, but one of the giraffe’s had come up to the platform. So we went back in and Em, Paps and Sean were up there quick as a flash, pellets in hand, to shove their way through and they got to feed him! It looked awesome, so when they came back Lisa and I went up, we stood behind a young family that handicapped girl in front of us, so we couldn’t really push through, so by the time we went to reposition ourselves the giraffe had had its fill and was goneski!!!! Oh well, I got some good photos of Em and Sean and the giraffes, so it was pretty cool in the end.
So we drove the 30 minutes back to town and got dropped off at the Masai Markets. Now I have done a lot of markets in my time, and I enjoy them. I like to barter and bargain with the shop keepers, making sure that we are both happy. I just want a fair price at the end of the day, as he has to still has to make a bob right. Well the second we got out of the taxi we were swarmed with men, pushing us and asking us where we were from etc. We got to the front gate, and I tell you this now and it sounds dodgy, but for whatever reason, we believed them, they told us we needed a guide to walk around the markets with. If you see something you like, it goes into a ‘maybe’ bag and at the end is when you do all your haggling (I know sounds dodgy now right). It was a terrible experience right from the start, as your ‘guide’ was there showing you all the stuff, asking if you liked wood, did you want drums etc. If you looked at something longer than 1 minute, he would bounce over and get it for you. Everywhere you turned they were there. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh Back off buster. Anyway we probably did about half of the market when we all looked at each other and said enough is enough let’s get out of here. So this is where the fun begins, as the ‘maybe’ bag had items in there we had no idea on cost.
I was a little cranky by this time, and it was time to get down to business – not a good combination. So I told my dude to not fluff around, give me your best price and let’s go from there. I made sure that I had a price in mind that I would think fair so I had a ball park figure, cause at this stage I still had no idea on what things actually cost except my bangles that I had bought previously. So first item up was a beautiful limestone plate – get this he wanted 250USD, okay so this i the way you want to play, I’m out. He didn’t like my upfront attitude of are you kidding, forget the plate – lets go onto the masks – what’s your best price – he wanted 30USD per mask, I had 3 – forget the masks, he is starting to give me a little lip and talk in his native tongue to a mate, which I told him was rude. Not an auspicious start to the whole bargaining process. Next up was the bangles, now I know how much I paid for these so he started at 6USD each ( I paid 2USD) so I told him to forget it and the last item on the overpriced market visit was a pretty cool limestone hippo (the size of a fist) and that was 35USD! That is ridiculous banter. I was walking away; he was so ripping me off that I was done and ready to leave. The others were also going through the same process. I was literally done, and he kept coming after me asking what my price was, well I told him what I was prepared to pay, which I though was fair and he huffed and puffed and told me I didn’t know how to bargain. Don’t tell me I don’t know how to bargain pal. Anyway after all the theatrics I got all my purchases for a tenth of the price and even then I think I got done, as he walked away with a massive smile on his face. I was happy with what got, but the whole process was annoying, a pain, restrictive and if I have advice to you, it is still go to the markets, but DO NOT take one of the guides, as it is CRAP that you need to have one and just deal with the sellers direct. I did see people walking around without guides but then it didn’t really click at that point. What a dickhead we were. I spoke to Katie later in the night, and she got some awesome bargains going around on her own. I am normally more switched on than that, but lesson learned. We were all pretty grumpy when we finally left the markets, cranky and agitated. We all thought the same and feel we had still been ripped off somehow!
Back to the hotel, to get ready for dinner and for our pre-departure meeting for our next leg of the trip. We lose 8 amazing people to a new tour, old truck and we gain 14 new family members for our trip and new truck. So we change trucks tomorrow, but 8 of our group get ‘our’ truck back for the next 14 days to Dar as Salam. The new group looks good. It is so hard coming off an amazing trip with amazing people to try and keep an open mind, but we need to give the new kids a chance and I look forward to meeting the new peeps.
We left a little before 7.30pm for dinner, half an hour behind the group, as out meeting ran longer, but when we got to Carnivores they hadn’t started eating yet, so we hadn’t missed much. Paps had on a traditional Cameroon outfit and he looked awesome. The food then started to come out. It was very much a similar experience if you have been to a Brazilian restaurant before. They just walk around with these massive skewers of meat, slice of pieces directly onto your plate and away you go on your road to meat fest! They don’t serve game meat, but what they did have was beef, chicken, lamb, camel, ostrich, ox balls, chicken gizzards, chicken wings, turkey, brains of some animal and ribs to name most of them. I did try the ox ball due to peer pressure and I think he gave me the fattiest most awful piece of all and I chewed and chewed and had to spit it out it was disgusting! The rest of the meal I stuck to what I knew and I really think it is hard to go wrong with BBQ meat right? For 30USD (plus tax – buggers) it was okay value with dessert and coffee included. The rip was the exchange if you wanted to pay in USD and the beers were 590 shillings (5.90AUD) when we were paying 150 shillings (1.50AUD) last night in Eldoret. Even for a restaurant markup that is massive! So when we came out, our taxi guy was waiting to take us home 2000 shillings in total ( 20AUD for a return trip) and then we had one more drink at the hotel bar before heading to bed at 11pm.
I still had to re-pack my 7 bags, internet a little, write up some postcards and then get up for 5.15am. Yeah we’ll see how we go with that.
So it is the end of another tour, being my ninth, I say goodbye to my Intrepid Gorilla’s, Chimps and Game Park friends. You guys are up there with my top tour buddies, top friends and I know I will be seeing most of you again sometime in the future on my travels. This is the worst part of any trip, but knowing that they are still travelling in another truck on a similar itinerary is the real sucker of this process. The itinerary varies on the first night, which makes us miss each other the whole way which is a little sucky. We may have a chance to catch up in the Serengeti, but we will have to keep our fingers crossed and hope for the best.
So a MASSIVE thanks to you guys and in no particular order:
Joey – Ireland J
Mike and Julia – Canada
Astrid – Australia
Lil – Australia
Jools – Kenya
Afke – Holland
Sean – Australia
Jimbob – Australia
Manu – Switzerland
Emma T – New Zealand
Laura – Australia
Brie – Australia
Katie – USA
Louise and Emma S – Australia
Preswick and Paps – Scotland and England
Pete and Mary – New Zealand
Lisa – New Zealand
Bring on the rest of Africa and I wish everyone safe travels to where ever their next adventure takes them, should it be somewhere else in this beautiful world we live in or travelling home. I’m going to really, really miss you guys xxx
Really miss you too... still!! Jo xx
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