The previous evening I had decided to eat dinner in my own room, since it was such a long walk to the main camp area, and I was very tired, and had been asked to cover up the used plates afterwards. Then during the night I heard a lot of banging, which I thought was the wind blowing the door around, but which turned out to be a genet coming for a late supper.

The following morning we observed a number of ravens enjoying themselves on the edge of the camp pool (), and then were taken to view some ancient cave paintings () on the other side of the hill.

We then went on a game drive forming part of our journey to our next stop of Joy's Camp, within Samburu itself. Along the way, after seeing even more gerenuk, and some domestic camels () (they had bells around their necks), we clocked up the new sighting of a Von der Decken hornbill (), below, and a crocodile close to the river bank (), below.

     

A nice sighting was then that of a mother elephant with its young (), opposite. We were then fascinated to see two giraffe, fighting. The way that it works is that they stand side by side, sometimes for minutes at a time (), below, and then one will ponderously whack its head into the neck or underbelly of the other (), below. They seem to take it in turn to do this, with huge pauses in between, and we watched them for quite some time. Occasionally it becomes more of a scramble (), opposite.

     

Next came a tiny dik-dik, pretending to be a gerenuk (), opposite. then, for a change from wildlife, we show below a tree with a number of nests formed by the black capped social weaver bird (), together with a close-up of one of these (), below.

     

Our subsequent drive to Joy's Camp was largely uneventful, enlivened slightly by our guide's elaborate headress (), together with some heavily laden donkeys carrying water back from a spring (). The actual area where Joy's Camp is located is heavily strewn with black volcanic rock (), below, which I found rather less than appealing, although in accord with the welcoming sign that greets visitors (), below.

     

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