Day 23, 24 & 25 – Masai Mara

This will be the first of three days in the Mara and we get off to a reasonable start, with little delay at the Talek gate of the Mara where pay our fees for three days that comes to US$750. We do not begrudge the money, but wish they would spend some of it on the roads and signage; again we rely on a compass and a map book that you can only buy at a Lodge curio shop in the Park for US$9.

We end up seeing a good deal of the Park over the 3 days and although we did not have the radios that the Safari vehicles have where they communicate their sightings for all to follow we saw a great deal and on many occasions did not have 30 safari vehicles around one poor lion or cheetah and being the peak season there were a lot of vehicles, which seemed to stick to the main tracks and rush from one sighting to another, I had two great spotters in Denise and Claudia and there was not much they missed.

The first thing we see is the huge herds of Wildebeest and Zebra that have crossed from the Serengeti, the former seemed to be on a mission and they walk in files two or three wide, then they stop and graze and then they stop and rest and then move on again on a predetermined route that is inbedded in their genes, simply remarkable, and once again our photos do not do the phenomenon justice. All we do not see over the three days is Rhino and Leopard.

This year the Mara was not running fast and deep and the main crossing happened earlier in July, but we were fortunate to witness some late stragglers coming through and Claudia captured it on video. Not so many lives lost this year, but the stench coming off the river at the Mara Bridge was very strong and there were a lot of carcasses being enjoyed by the vultures and maribu storks and we saw a lot of carcasses mainly Wildebeest along the road side, which we were told were either lion kills not eaten as they were full or injured in the crossing, needless to say the vultures must think it is Christmas.

Our stay was very enjoyable and we have lots of little stories that I do not have time to relate on the blog.

Planned to send you some fabulous photos, but the system is so slow hear in Nairobi, if I get time tomorrow will just add some photos