Ammon:
started driving up a “mountain” (big hill) and stopped near the top for a bathroom break. There was also a snack shop so we got black cherry Fanta and Pringles. We saw Ketchup Pringles. How disgusting. Drove again then stopped at a near a grocery store for a bathroom break. But because we were walking by, I smelled some donuts. So after we did BTHBRK we got some donuts. Drove to a gas station and filled up. Found out that our safari vehicle has 2 tanks. Then we got to our hotel (which is just 2 small shacks. 1 is a restaurant and the other one is 2 room lodging).
LaReita:
Our Maasai guide and driver (Enoch and Dan) came to pick us up in the traditional safari Land Rover, complete with a “National Geographic” logo in the back window. As a kid I loved watching National Geographic on PBS, and reading the magazines that Grandma Jeppesen subscribed to.
It was a 5 hour total drive from Nairobi to the Maasai Mara. I told our FMF friend and contact, Edith Njapit (a Maasai), that I wanted to support a Maasai business and not the Chinese camps. Our accommodations were definitely different than our nice Kenyan-run Nairobi hotel, but it was not a traditional Maasi bamboo frame and cow-dung-mud home. It was not a shack as Ammon described. But we did have to sleep with 2 layers of nets. You can see the pics if you want.
I learned more about the pervasiveness of the Chinese influence into the Kenyan infrastructures. Including the newly paved road they built from Narok (a half-way point from Nairobi) to the gate of the Maasai Mara. It previously took 5 hours from Narok to the gate, but now it is only 1 hour. (So before the road went in, it would be 9-10 hours from Nairobi to the Maasai Mara.)
The road is now paved, but is already experiencing potholes because there is only 1 inch of asphalt with no road-base. I’m not exaggerating. Dave would exaggerate it to 1/2 inch. But this really is an inch.
Sigh. I look forward to the day when more people will start treating each other with respect and concern.