Country EARS
Previous Story or Go to First or Next
Touch down at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport. Stepping out of the aircraft and into a breezy evening, I take in the lights, sounds, pulse of Nairobi. As far as I am concerned, I’m already at the Edge of Wild!
Pun most definitely intended, as I embark on this adventure with EOW Travel & Photography team.
E-visa documents handy, I move through Immigration swiftly. I am practically waved through customs. Just then an officer stops me.
Paranoid, my mind races — is it my camera equipment, is it something else? The officer points to the duty-free bag dangling from my arm and instructs me to dispose of it before exiting the channel. That’s all. s
Tip to fellow travelers: Kenya has banned plastic bags/packaging, and if in violation you can be fined up to $40,000 or jailed for 4 years!
Edge of Wild co-founders and my co-travelers Gurdyal Singh and Siddhartha Ghosh a.k.a. Guru and Sid greet me with enthusiasm, and a professional sense of ‘let’s get the show on the road’. And soon enough, the hotel’s car whisks us into the night.
6:00 AM: Hair still wet, I report at the hotel lobby, glad to find our complimentary breakfast neatly packed to go. The previous night, we just shed our luggage and immediately crawled into bed, so now I’m recharged and ready to hit the road.
As we leave the city limits, and climb to higher elevation, we see the landscape open up on the left. Before we know it, we are in the heart of the Great Rift Valley.
To be specific, we are in the Kenya Rift region — the eastern branch of the East Africa Rift System, referred to as EARS. We pull over to the side to marvel at one of the geological wonders of our time, comparable to the formation of the Grand Canyon.
With realization that at the very moment, we stand abreast a continent tearing apart, I wonder if years later we may need special permit to make the same journey from Nairobi to Maasai Mara! But I digress. With some record shots, and breakfast tucked in our tummies, onward we go.
Next pitstop: Narok, a flourishing commerce center, where we stock up on supplies.
Shotgun! I decide to ride shotgun and hop on the passenger side of the Land Rover — a decision I mildly regret as soon as the highway transforms into miles of semi-off-roading. Sitting in the front means intercepting dust-showers, but the driver and I have worked out a system for when to leave the window open vs. frantically roll-up at the sight of oncoming vehicles.
The terrain has changed into long flat stretches of Maasai-owned lands, punctuated with cacti as large as trees. We are lucky to have some sightings along the way — black-shouldered kites and raptors soaring right above the road.
All this, to the sound-track of country music! Yes — you read that right. Apparently, in addition to some beautiful Maasai tracks, our driver buddy has a collection of good old southern tunes. African countryside visuals with American country audio — disorienting, but interesting.
Follow Edge of Wild on Facebook Page , Facebook Group , Instagram