Kenya : Day One : London to Nairobi and Amboseli

Our Virgin Airways flight to Nairobi landed at just before 8.30 a.m., after giving us a marvellous view of the sunrise. A 40 minute flight then took us to a first destination, Amboseli National Park, in the south of Kenya. Rather than head straight to camp we were taken on an extended first game drive, followed by a bush lunch at the base of the well-known 'Observation Hill' landmark.

Our first game sighting was of two elegant zebra (camera icon), followed by a number of elephant that were half-hidden in a swamp (camera icon), and several wildebeest. Further, bird, sightings included a sacred ibis (camera icon), below, together with their young (camera icon), below.

     

On our way to lunch we saw further elephant (camera icon) giraffe (camera icon), and a spotted hyena (camera icon), below, and several Grant's Gazelle (camera icon), below.

     

Also of interest was a pied kingfisher (camera icon), below, and a number of weaver bird nests (camera icon), below, high up in the trees.

     

A particularly rare sighting was that of a long-tailed fiscal shrike (camera icon).

A further number of wildebeest were observed on our approach to Observation Hill (camera icon), below, where we stopped for lunch, surrounded by a whole bunch of quite tame, and very inquisitive, superb starlings (camera icon), below. A nearby female baboon also took a considerable interest in our lunch (camera icon).

     

Here we were also able to make the very clear comparison between the open sided game viewing vehicle (camera icon), below, provided by our hosts, Game Watchers Safaris, and the far inferior closed sided type so common in Kenya and elsewhere (camera icon), below.

     

After lunch we proceeded on our way to Porini Amboseli Camp, where we were to stay for our first night, and which is actually situated over an hour's drive from the National Park.

There wasn't much further game to see along the way. The camp itself was fairly basic in construction, with quite private and widely spaced tents (camera icon), which were simply, but comfortably, furnished (camera icon).

On arrival we were served a good meal outside in the open (camera icon), followed by drinks around a communal camp fire, and then a welcome early night.

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