Mama warthog.

It's funny to watch the warthogs run because they point their tails straight up in the air like an antenna. They live in burrows in the ground. So do the hyenas!

I am enjoying another opportunity to do a blog entry. Like yesterday, scroll down to see each photo as they come through individually. I am in the 'tent' listening to the hyena out in front. hopefully a ways away! They make a funny sound that is like blowing into the top of a pop bottle. We had to have a significantly large lizard chased out of the tent and are constantly warding off rhino beetles that are huge, like the size of a small plum! And then there are the many many spiders. Other than that the accommodation and food is absolutely outstanding. Thanks for checkin' the blog.

The village.

This was in the Sukuma village. This photo is taken along main street. There are 3,000 people living in the village so it was considered a larger one. The Sukuma people represent 1 of the 142 tribes in Tanzania. In this village, over 10%
of the people are living with AIDS - most of them women. There is an orphanage in the village and 25 children live in it.

Storks at the Sukuma village on Lake Victoria, Tanzania

These are freakishly tall storks and they sit perched on the top of trees. The are at least a meter tall!

Rock hyrax.

These little hyrax are all around this part of the Serengeti. They are about the size of a cat and are super fast running on the rocks and across the top of our tents. They have 4 toes on their front feet and 3 on the back.

A leopard.

Driving behind the hearse....with the coffin on top!

Hi. I am so happy to be able to blog.... especially from my tent in the heart of the Serengeti in Tanzania. No cell coverage but I can blog today and tomorrow for sure. It's midnight and I have to leap out of bed at 5:15 for an early morning game drive so I best finish up the blogging! I am only able to post one photo at a time from the ipad so you will just have to keep scrolling down through 16 new posts to see them all. The 16th post was intended to be the first one but I only now realized it will be the last one. Eventually I'll get the hang of this. Anyhow, thanks for checking in on us! We've all managed to over-shop and are quickly running out of luggage space!

REMEMBER click on the photo to enlarge it for a better view.

Typical street scene....chaos?

Hyena pup

missing Maggie and Joanne

Zebra

Baby zebra are born with brown stripes!

Giraffe

Leopard

Baboon

Ostrich

Female ostrich all lay their eggs together in one nest!

Road shot. Kenya

Visiting with the Samburu people of Kenya

We had such a great time in a Samburu village. Learned so much about the people and their culture. They are nomadic by nature but have settled into this spot for 8 years as they built a school and want to be able to stay. Their diet consists only of milk, meat and blood. We have been enlightened on the very traditional roles of men and women as well as the traditional practices of male and female circumcision. About 10 cows will get you the Samburu wife or wives of your choice.

This was me with 2yr old 'Salamina' who came and took my hand to get me to dance!

A topi.

Lots of photos to catch up on!

Yipee, I can blog.....today and tomorrow for sure!

I can only seem to do one photo at a time from the ipad so they will come up as individual posts so you will have to check them all out.

We have so much to share with everyone! Every day has been an adventure of wildlife, unbelievably awful roads, the occasional dead hippo and people, people, people! We are now into the Serengeti, having crossed into Tanzania yesterday. The fourth poorest country in the world. The big difference between the Kenyan safari camps and the Tanzanian ones is that in Tanzania they are not fenced in to keep the wild animals out. We have to be escorted to our 'tents' whenever it is dark out. I leaped out of bed a few minutes ago because something was scratching at the front of the tent. I could tell it was smaller than a predator so felt somewhat safe to assume it was maybe a vervet monkey??? Our journey yesterday was extended into a 12 hour drive on the worst roads any of us have travelled. Unfortunately we had to take the long route because of the recent rains, otherwise it would have been a 5 hour journey. The road conditions and constant interruptions of goats, cows, people and zebra on the road etc etc, lead to 400km taking 7 hours to drive!

SAFARI time....only words and no pictures....I think it's due to the very s l o w internet??

Hi everyone who checks the blog! We have been completely and totally rural and in the bush. This is definately a rare and welcomed "blog opoportunity"! I will start first by saying we are all great and all safely travelling the back country of Kenya. We get tid bits of news updates that tell us of Somolian unrest. What we know for sure is that we feel safe and well looked after. Tourism is key to Kenyan economy so tourists are treated extremely well by all.

On a lighter note, we have had an amazing few days into our safari adventure and topped it off this evening with some great sightings of flamingos, a jackel, white rhinos, lions and our third rare leopard sighting! The 'cats' seem to be the most elusive and therefore the toughest to see. We spent last night at what they call The Ark. A very beautiful lush green spot where the animals came to us! There were big open decks set in front and along side The Ark that was situated in front of a large green space and a watering hole. We watched hyenas and water buffalo, mongoose and a garet cat, impalas and water buck. Then with the assist of some flood lighting we watched in awe, a dozen elephants and a tiny baby as they came to drink and dine. We sat and watched for well over and hour.

A couple of days ago we side tripped from the game drive to spend a morning at a Samburu village. What an experience. They danced and performed and showed us deep into their way of life encouraging us to ask any and all questions and to visit with the village people. We learned personal details of their way of life and spent time in their school that they were very proud of. The children sang and we very entertaining and lots of fun. I fell in love with 'Salamina' who was two, naked from the waist down and came and took me by the hand to dance with her! One of the many things we learned of the Samburu people is that they eat ONLY meat, milk and blood!

We are here in the rainy season so most days we have a heavy rain that lasts only about 20 minutes or so and leaves many puddles in the otherwise dry dusty "bad" roads.

Cheryl and I found ourselves in the local toilet facilities today but ended up with a true African experience! The food is great with lots of variety and some great fruit, coffee, tea and we manage to get in Tusker time for happy hour! (a refreshing Kenyan beer)

Thanks for checking in and hopefully another blog opportunity will arise very soon!

Erin's post

Hey everybody it's Erin Jan's daughter if u don't know me. My mom texted me and told me to tell everyone that they won't be in a service area for posting or updating the blog for a while unless by random chance. They are having a great time so far and are all safe! My mom bought an African cell phone so that's how we are keeping in contact! So I'm going to tell a little bit about the last few days. So far the animals they've seen are elephants,olive baboons, bush buck, dikdik, grants gazelles, gerenuk, giraffes, scrub hair, impalas, lions, vervet monkeys, oryx, grevy's zebra and the most recent animal is a leopard! That seem's like it would be so exciting but no pictures to share yet! Today they went to a Samburu village and it was amazing and a great experience! Their safari tour guide is getting married in a few years and to be able to get married he has to get 12 cows to grant his wife and her family with. Each cow costs about $100 which my mom says would take about 1 year for him to get that money, so yesterday they put some of their money together and bought him 1 cow so now he has about 8 cows, 1 cow closer to getting married! Hopefully they will be in an area where they can post photo's soon but if not I'll keep everyone updated! (:

Kibera and some dancing!

HEY! Thanks for following the blog. If you want to see a picture "bigger", just click on it and enlarge it.

Started today at a slower pace and spent some creative thinking and time getting money out of a variety of ATM's before we all had a successful withdrawl. Met up with Fredo, our very great driver, around noon and headed for lunch at one of Nairobi's Java Cafe's. From there we went on to see the outer limits and a view of Kibera. This is home to over a million underprivileged people and is believed to be the largest concentrated 'slum' in Kenya.

We stopped to take in some local handcraft shopping and quickly realized we are all pretty lousy at bartering. From there on to join many hundreds of school children for a great performance of traditional dancing and music!

More elephant babies!

After much stress and frustration.....i think we figured out how to over-ride the ipads inability to put pictures on the blog.....this is a test......yipee, it worked!!

Nairobi

Arrived in Nairobi all intact and accommpanied by all our baggage. Including a 75lb hockey bag of medical paraphernalia and a 65lb bag of bras and glasses! Met up with Biz and Cheryl at the Stanley hotel and tried the local beer before snoozing.

Had an amazing day seeing Nairobi. Joanne and I seem to have missed our HIV/AIDS experience as the communication between Swahili and English wasn't so effective. No loss though as we all thoroughly enjoyed the elephant orphanage. Learned and saw a lot. Had a great day lead by Martha and Fredo who shared their world with us. We shopped at a women's cooperative facility of pottery and glass beads, the local Kenyan handcraft shop and enriched our senses with the colors and and talents of the locals. Visited the "Keren Blixen" museum. The woman who life was depicted in the movie Out Of Africa.

Kerry, Joanne, Biz and further over, Cheryl.

Hindsight.

Maggie points out "Kenya"

Vermet monkey.

Waiting in Amsterdam

We're sitting here in the Amsterdam airport having been checked, scanned and body searched through what seemed to be an odd security set-up in the boarding area? However, a l-o-n-g flight from Calgary and we are here about to board to Nairobi! Super modern and very nice Amsterdam airport. Good cheese and nice tulips. Maggie, Joanne, Kerry and I could certainly use some sleep. We have an 8-ish hour flight and arrive late tonight in Nairobi. Thanks for checkin' in on us. Looking forward to connecting up with Elizabeth and Cheryl.

Packed and ready??

THANK YOU to everyone that dropped off and collected bras, eyeglasses and stethoscopes! In less than 3 days we accumulated about 400 bras, over 100 pairs of glasses and a few well needed stethoscopes. We've packed them off and Joanne and I (Jan) look forward to delivering them to the clinic in Arusha, Tanzania. Thanks for "the support"!

Cheryl and Elizabeth left today and are well on their way to Nairobi. Maggie, Kerry, Joanne and myself depart in the morning!