Masai Mara: the spell of Africa
Feeling in Nairobi one I had before in other African cities, but here I feel insecure. I love again the reddish color of the earth, the comings and goings of nations, Kenyatta Avenue They crossing the road and jumping into cars, Nevermind that can be run over. You have to be a skilled driver to dare to drive around Nairobi.
African wild vegetation tries to break through the skyscrapers of this city where air is breathed some English, a Hindu air, and a whiff of that warm and sticky Africa, which you hooked on the skin, he gets ruthless in your veins and you never loose.
Despite the environment golden Nairobi, we sense a ferocious city, indomesticable
Roads in the center are more or less tarred, but the planning organization is so chaotic that there is no space for pedestrians, I monopolize all vehicles, It advancing either the right or left, speeding up, Dry braking, before the astonished gaze of a giant ravens challenging resting on the tops of the jacarandas. Suddenly take flight with wings and hit the window of the car, making it clear that the first to take the place were they.
By morning the city is covered by a gray blanket, between pollution and clouds, but in the afternoon the sky opens and the city is covered with a bright and intense ocher. Although the environment in a fierce golden city intuits, indomesticable.
The Masai Mara is unique on earth, where one really enters the "evil Africa"
And exhausts me, I'm looking for quieter places, of endless landscapes.
We leave by road to the mythical Masai Mara. The road is pretty good coming out of Nairobi. We walk about 150 kilometers to Narok, the last village before leaving the paved road and enter a clue. From Narok to the reserve there as 120 insufferable kilometers of track, passable only on 4×4.
I think almost everything has been said about the Masai Mara and is likely to be the most visited place in the whole of East Africa. But that does not stop remains a magical place, to which you are still many words to write, one on earth, where one really enters the "evil Africa", which leaves behind forever part of what was, and enters a space you always want to come back. Where the vastness of the horizon clear evidence that the earth is indeed round, where Karen Blixen, Hemingway the Ryszard Kapuscinski They wrote spell words, because this wasteland is it, a huge piece of land that captivates and enchants forever.
Here you leave behind forever part of what you were, and you enter a space that always want to return
The only place in the world where so many mammals live in the wild.
As advances are driving, silhouetted against the horizon, wildebeest, antelopes, ... zebras crossing the quiet road a group of elephants, Beyond the tall, elegant giraffes munching on tree leaves.
At dawn and dusk appear predators. Around the Mara River, sloping down to the Serengeti in Tanzania, marauding lions, waiting for zebras, wildebeest or buffalo dare to cross. Lie within the river sedate family hippos and crocodiles underwater. Vultures and hyenas prey to divide up the scraps left a lion.
Today the only shots that are heard are those of the incessant cameras visitors
At the beginning of the twentieth century Kenya became the great hunting destination across Africa, where came aristocrats, mostly English bloodthirsty and strong emotions. It is a miracle that so many animal species have survived and today the only shots that are heard are those of the incessant cameras visitors.
The Masai Mara is inhabited by masai, at other times feared warriors, today maintained ancestral customs, passing day as nomadic herders of their livestock available. Still they feed on milk and blood drawn from their cows, and its elegant appearance and beauty, It seems to be more than enough.
This place does not leave anybody impassive. Longing to return to have that red dirt on the soles of shoes, hear the roar of a lion or an elephant trumpeting in the distance at night from the tent and to rest in the afternoon under the shade of an acacia, be there forever.
Mayte organizes trips to the Masai Mara. For more information please contact her at: may.toca@gmail.com
Comments (1)
Edurne
| #
Mayte Thanks for putting a golden touch to this gray and rainy day and get closer to a destination as desired. Still more telling things!! a hug
Answer