Mombasa

So, I left Kenya last week and have been to busy faffing about with all the things I should have organised months ago to update the blog. Little things mostly like getting a bank card and buying travel insurance yesterday - nothing too important.
The main bit to talk about from Mombasa is obviously my Dad's wedding which went more or less smoothly. There were little hitches such as me having the wrong size tux (might have been an idea to try it on before the wedding day - had to wear it open which left me looking like I was about to belt out a bit of opera for most of the photos), there was the last minute learning how to tie bow ties, the arguments with the chef over the wedding dinner menu and the photographer who had decided that an abstract theme was appropriate. But hey, the champas flowed and all were kept merry!
All in all we spent 9 days at a 5* resort - just enough time too laze about and give myself 3rd degree sunburn. Entertainment took the form of hundreds of rounds of gin rummy over beers whilst discussing (mocking) my 16 yr old brother's love life and giving him the benefit of my wisdom (bitter cynicism). When this grew tired, we took up the traditional past-time of laughing at foreigner's names. You may think this bad but I challenge you to be served by 'Minga' and not find it funny! Not to mention 'Weldone' - why couldn't they put steak on the menu just once?!?
Anyway, the highlight (apart from the wedding of course!) was the snorkelling. Kenya has 1 of the 3 best coral reefs in the world and we spent a couple of hours swimming amongst brightly coloured fish, elaborate coral formations, all manner of shelled creatures and then putting sea cucumbers down each other's shorts. Not mature, not very nice but funny none the less.
There was meant to be other water sports on the go but the Kayaks lacked the small but important addition of paddles and the wind surfing seemed to coincide the the sceduled sitting by the pool with a drink and some food - damn shame!
I did partake in a game of beach volleyball but ended up doing a passable impression of Dale Winton stacking shelves so thought I'd give it a miss from then on.

So all that was a lot of fun but not the real Kenya we had seen glimpses of the week before. We were very isolated in the resort with local contact limited to the souvinier sellars on the beach (who ripped us off at every opportunity, but spending double what we would in the local market only cost us an extra couple of quid which means a lot more to them than to me so fair play)
It was humbling and uncomfortable to think that we were paying for an orange juice what the field workers we had seen in Nakura earnt in a day. At least the tips that we handed to the waiters and service staff went back to their families in these areas rather than all the money going to the big tour company.

Kenya - Masi Mara

So, to kick off my year or so of travels I'm in Kenya for a couple of weeks for my Dad's wedding. This has both the good point of giving me a trial run for packing etc (already got a pile of stuff I'm not going to bother taking) and the bad point of getting me used to 5star when I'm more likely to be seeing stars through the holes in my rooms for the next year.
Kenya has been absolutely amazing so far. We have spent the first week in the bush and on safari in the Masi Mara. We visited a local school - very humbling and really demonstrated the level of poverty here. My youngest brother had bit of a reality check when told that some children walked 15km a day to attend the school! He may be rethinking asking Mum for lifts to his friends houses constantly - we'll see.
We've seen a shed load of wildlife (not an actual shed obviously, that wouldn't be very impressive); Hippos, Water Buffalo, Hyena eating Water Buffalo, a flock of over 1 million Flamingo (try fitting them in that shed), Rhinos, Lions, Elephants, Giraffes, Warthogs (nothing like the lion king, these are ugly as sin), Crocs, Wilderbeast, Zebra, Cheetahs, Baboons and more. Nearly worth getting up at 6am for the game drives.
The highlight had to be Friday; up at 4.30am (okay shit start but it gets better), took a hot airr balloon over the Mara for sunrise, chased some Rhino (sensible from the air, not advisable on ground), landed in the middle of nowhere for a champagne breakfast, listened to an American gentleman ask the guys at the souvenir stand if they took visa??!! Look around buddy!!
Then spent the afternoon on a game drive and saw a Lioness make a kill of a Wilderbeast and teach her cubs how to hunt. We were only about 10 ft away which was very cool but I could have forgone seeing her rip the penis off - collective "ooooh!" from the onlookers.
This was followed on Saturday by a visit to a Masi village
I'm pretty convinced they changed the words of their songs as there was some definite sniggering. The 12yr old in our group was very disappointed to have to give back the machete they sold him.
We then took a very small plane to Nairobi (you've never experienced turbulance until you've flown in one of these! Does anyone know what a "Squelch"switch does?) where we ended up watching England vs Kazachstan whilst being serenaded by a very very poor Kenyan Jazz cover band - a very surreal day indeed! And to round it off; Dad smashed his head in the pool - should make for some good wedding snaps!
We're now in Mombasa chilling at a beach resort for the week and holding the wedding. I'll probably post again on the weekend, maybe with some wedding disaster video I can get cash for.
The connection is to slow to upload any photos on this post or to Flickr here but I'll post a link once I've done it.

Hope you're all well -There's a subscription link on this page if you want to keep up to date with my travels.
Karibu! (been told that means welcome but i may have just insulted your mother - sorry)