Tuesday, July 13th -- Nachesa = "Fun"

This morning I woke up to the noise of the hippos moaning! It was pretty evident that it was not a person making this noise. I drank a cup of tea at 6:00 am when I woke up for the morning drive.

I finished the book "Unbowed" today. Wangari Maathai writes about the choice we all have, "We can either sit in an ivory tower wondering how so many people could be so poor and not work to change their situation, or we can try to help them escape the vicious cycle they have found themselves in."

Some of the highlights of today included seeing a train of 9 elephants traveling in a line in perfect rhythm. They were positioned with an adult elephant in between each of the babies and teenage elephants. We saw a bunch of topi which are a type of antelope. Although we saw many of them, they are regionally extinct in a few countries. Like the previous day, we saw many wildebeest. They were traveling in a herd as far as the eye could see. Each of them seemed to be keeping track of the others. However, one of them was hurt from what looked to be a crocodile bite and was left behind. Sammy, our guide, told us that it would be eaten by a hyena before the day was over. Sadly, this is how the circle of life occurs. The younger ones long black, bristles whipped back at forth as they galloped to keep up. We also saw four babboons together. Two of them were babies that were contently sitting in adults laps. Today I was able to really see how all of the animals in the kingdom know their role and peacefully coexist for the most part. The entire time I felt like I was watching many of the animals in pairs just as with Noah's Ark. Back at our camp, we walked down to the river with two of the Maasai guards, James and Solya. We saw a crocodile on the river and an elephant that was about 200 yards away from our camp!

During lunch, I got to know some of the other travelers at our camp. Author Dale Peterson and photographer Karl Ammann are writing and taking pictures for their next book about giraffes. Dale has written 16 books about different animals in the wildlife and was very interesting to talk to. He told me that my major of Finance will support me monetarily for the rest of my life but my minor in Writing is what will make me human.

After lunch, we took a break and then went out for a spectacular afternoon drive. We saw two male lions that were sleeping. The animals that are breathing heavily, almost as if they are panting, while they are sleeping have just eaten. We saw impala, ostriches, and a cheetah. The male impala have bigger horns than the females. The male ostrichs are black and white while the females are gray. Needless to say, today was filled with "nachesa" times.