An African adventure part 6: Kicheche Maasai bush camp to Kinondo Kwetu

White-browed Coucal 

Kenya’s borders, as in most of Africa, do not reflect social or tribal boundaries. Many borders are straight lines drawn by European colonialists with a ruler while paying scant regard to tribal and cultural differences. Kenya boasts 42 separate tribes with different languages and cultures that all somehow peacefully merge to become the unique mix of Kenyan culture. While the official languages of Kenya are Swahili and English each tribe also has its own language. This means that many Kenyans speak at least three languages putting the linguistic skills of most English folk to considerable shame. By and large Kenya has avoided the tribal conflict that neighbouring countries have suffered in recent times with such terrible human cost. So perhaps it is not too surprising that the biggest desire of most Kenyans is simply for a peaceful existence. Apart from the main driver of comfort and security for their friends and family, so much of Kenya’s economy is tourist driven that any trouble would cause considerable additional hardship in a country where many people already survive in deep poverty.

While staying at Kicheche Maasai bush camp the lovely managers, Darren and Emma, told us about a woman’s co-operative a short drive from the camp and we were immediately keen to visit. Maa Beadwork is an empowerment project for over 400 Maasai woman around the Maasai Mara, many of whom have suffered abusive relationships or forced marriages. Their co-operative aims to give the woman craft skills to enable them to become financially self-sufficient. On arrival we were giving a short talk on the co-operative by the manager and then met some of the woman who were producing beautiful items using traditional Maa bead work. Each item is sold labelled with a picture of the producer and a little bit about her background and hopes and aspirations. We brought a few items and gifts to take home including two lovely beaded leather leads for our dogs.

The Maasai Mara hosts a very unusual and possibly unique coalition of five male cheetahs as featured recently on BBC’s Seven Worlds One Planet. It is believed to consist of two pairs of brothers plus the collation leader. The coalition specialises in wildebeest which are normally considered too large for a cheetah to hunt. They have adopted a very clever strategy whereby the four junior cheetahs will often act as a distraction while the lead cheetah sneaks up on its prey. Their famous turn of speed can only be sustained in short bursts so to give a good chance of a successful kill the lead male must get within fifty or so meters of the target. We were very lucky to encounter the gang of five on one of our safari drives and spent several hours watching them prowling the bush.

We also met a female with five young boisterous cubs. Unlike lion cubs the cheetah cubs don’t resemble miniature versions of the fully grown adult. Rather they have evolved to more closely resemble the very aggressive honey badgers and are hence normally left very well alone!

Cheetah cubs

Kori Bustard

Of all the wonderful birds we encountered in the Maasai Mara perhaps the strangest was the Kori Bustard. Perhaps it’s just me but its proportions seem all wrong rather as if it has visited one of those very unflattering halls of mirrors and come out stuck in the distorted image!

Ruppell's long-tailed Starling

Yellow-billed Oxsucker

Oxpeckers were very much in evidence on the grazing herds hyperactively removing ticks and other insects from the animals while gaining a tasty meal in return.

Sooty Chat

Grey Woodpecker

Malachite Kingfisher

Malachite Kingfisher

Three-banded Plover

Grey-headed Kingfisher

African Wattled Plover

Sooty Falcon

White-browed Coucal

Grey-backed Fiscal

Fig the Leopard

Baboon

Banded Mongoose

After three wonderful days at bush camp we said a sad goodbye to Darren, Emma and Vinnie and flew to Diani beach just north of Mombasa on Kenya’s east coast. Previous experience had taught us that safari holidays can be quite exhausting with many early starts and long days so we had planned to spend our last three days on holiday at a beach resort overlooking the Indian ocean. This was total chill-out time with little planned in terms of birdwatching and other activities, just lazing about eating, drinking, reading and dozing before heading home. I did, however, have one particularly memorable wildlife encounter. On our last morning Carolyn got up early for a horse ride along the beach and I was dozing in bed when I heard something fall off our bedroom table. Assuming something had just rolled off I sat up to see a money sitting on the end of the bed! I’m not sure who was more surprised but after staring at each other for a few seconds the monkey beat a hasty retreat! The hosts subsequently told me that a couple of the local troop of Colobus monkeys had built up the courage to enter the accommodation in search of tasty treats left lying around by unsuspecting tourists. Apparently one monkey had got into someone’s bedroom and run off with an unfortunately chap's iPhone. The monkey took it into a tree and after a couple of bites decided it was not edible and threw the heavily damaged phone back on the ground.

Colobus Monkey

We flew back to Nairobi on October 14^th and had a last Kenyan drink in the rooftop bar of the airport Sheraton where we had started our African adventure just two short weeks ago. We both agreed that it was the most wonderful holiday we have had and promised each other that we would definitely return to Kenya and its truly wonderful people soon.

The complete bird list

1	Yellow-breasted Apalis
2	Black-lored Babbler
3	Brown Babbler
4	d'Arnaud's Barbet
5	Red-and-yellow Barbet
6	Red-fronted Barbet
7	Bateleur
8	Pygmy Batis
9	Little Bee-eater
10	White-throated Bee-eater
11	Northern Red Bishop
12	Slate-colured Boubou
13	Brubru
14	Common Bulbul
15	Black-bellied Bustard
16	Kori Bustard
17	White-bellied Bustard
18	Augur Buzzard
19	White-bellied Canary
20	Yellow-fronted Canary
21	Northern Anteater Chat
22	Sooty Chat
23	White-shouldered Cliff Chat
24	Rufous Chatterer
25	Rattling Cisticola
26	Wing-snapping Cisticola
27	Great Cormorant
28	Long-tailed Cormorant
29	White-browed Coucal
30	Heuglin's Courser
31	Temmick's Courser
32	Grey Crowned Crane
33	Red-faced Crombec
34	House Crow
35	Pied Crow
36	Diederik Cuckoo
37	White-breasted Cuckoo-shrike
38	African Darter
39	African Mourning Dove
40	Emerald-spotted Wood Dove
41	Laughing Dove
42	Namaqua Dove
43	Red-eyed Dove
44	Ring-necked Dove
45	Common Drongo
46	Yellow-billed Duck
47	African Fush Eagle
48	Banded Snake Eagle
49	Long-crested Eagle
50	Martial Eagle
51	Tawny Eagle
52	Verreaux's Eagle
53	Cattle Egret
54	Great Egret
55	Little Egret
56	Yellow-billed Egret
57	Lanner Falcon
58	Sooty Falcon
59	Red-billed Firefinch
60	Grey-backed Fiscal
61	Taita Fiscal
62	Greater Flamingo
63	Lesser Flamingo
64	African Grey Flycatcher
65	African Paradise Flycatcher
66	Pale Flycatcher
67	White-eyed Slaty Flycatcher
68	Coqui Francolin
69	Shelly's Francolin
70	White-bellied Go-away-bird
71	Egyptian Goose
72	Spur-winged Goose
73	Gabar Goshawk
74	Little Grebe
75	Helmeted Guineafowl
76	Grey-headed Gull
77	Hamerkop
78	Montagu's Harrier
79	White-crested Helmet-shrike
80	Black-headed Heron
81	Goliath Heron
82	Green-backed Heron
83	Grey Heron
84	Purple Heron
85	Squacco Heron
86	Hoopoe
87	Crowned Hornbill
88	Hemprich's Hornbill
89	Jackson's Hornbill
90	Red-billed Hornbill
91	Trumpeter Hornbill
92	Von der Decken's Hornbill
93	Glossy Ibis
94	Hadada Ibis
95	Sacred Ibis
96	African Jacana
97	Giant Kingfisher
98	Malachite Kingfisher
99	Pied Kingfisher
100	Striped Kingfisher
101	Black-shouldered Kite
102	Pink-breasted Lark
103	Red-capped Lark
104	Rufous-naped Lark
105	Singing Bush Lark
106	Yellow-throated Longclaw
107	Plain Martin
108	Blue-naped Mousebird
109	Speckled Mousebird
110	Nubian Nightjar
111	Slender-tailed Nightjar
112	Black-headed Oriole
113	Common Ostrich
114	African Scops Owl
115	Greyish Owl
116	Spotted Eagl-owl
117	Verreaux's Eagle-owl
118	White-faced Scops Owl
119	Pearl-spotted Owlet
120	Red-billed Oxpecker
121	Yellow-billed Oxpecker
122	Eurasian Oystercatcher
123	Brown Parisoma
124	Brown Parot
125	Great White Pelican
126	Yellow-spotted Petronia
127	Speckled Pigeon
128	Grassland Pipit
129	Plain-backed Pipit
130	Blacksmith Plover
131	Black-winged Plover
132	Crowned Plover
133	Grey Plover
134	Kittliz's Plover
135	Ringed Plover
136	Senagal Plover
137	Spur Winged Plover
138	Three-banded Plover
139	Banded Prinia
140	Green-winged Pytiia
141	Red-billed Quelea
142	White-browed Robin-chat
143	Lilac-breasted Roller
144	Rufous-crowned Roller
145	Ruff
146	Sanderling
147	Yellow-throated Sandgrouse
148	Common Sandpiper
149	Marsh Sandpiper
150	Terek Sandpiper
151	Black Saw-wing
152	Abyssian Scimitarbill
153	Secretary Bird
154	Northern White-crowned Shrike
155	Yellow-billed Shrike
156	Silverbird
157	Chestnut Sparrow
158	Grey-headed Sparrow
159	House Sparrow
160	Fischer's Sparrow-lark
161	White-browed Sparrow-weaver
162	African Spoonbill
163	Yellow-necked Spurfowl
164	Bristle-crowned Starling
165	Greated Blue-eared Starling
166	Hilderbrandt's Starling
167	Red-winged Starling
168	Ruppell's Long-tailed Starling
169	Superb Starling
170	Vilot-backed Starling
171	Wattled Starling
172	Black-winged Stilt
173	Little Stint
174	Marabou Stork
175	Yellow-billed Storl
176	Collared Sunbird
177	Eastern-Violet-backed Sunbird
178	Marico Sunbird
179	Red-chested Sunbird
180	Beautiful Sunbird
181	Barn Swallow
182	Ethiopian Swallow
183	Red-rumped Swallow
184	Wire-tailed Swallow
185	African Black Swift
186	Little Swift
187	Hottentot Teal
188	Red-billed Teal
189	Whiskered Tern
190	White-winged Tern
191	Red-tailed Ground Thrush
192	Spotted Ground Thrush
193	Mose-colured Penduline Tit
194	White-bellied Tit
195	Ruddy Turnstone
196	African White-backed Vulture
197	Lappet-faced Vulture
198	Ruppell's Griffon Vulture
199	Buff-bellied Warbler
200	Pale Wren Warbler
201	Common Waxbill
202	Chestnut Weaver
203	Grey-capped Social Weaver
204	Jackson's Golded-backed Weaver
205	Lesser Masked Weaver
206	Norther Masked Weaver
207	Red-headed Weaver
208	White-headed Buffalo Weaver
209	Isabelline Wheatear
210	Norther Wheatear
211	Green Wood-hoopoe
212	Bearded Woodpecker
213	Cardinal Woodpecker
214	Gret Woodpecker
215	Nubian Wood pecker