Is That The Easter Hyena Hop Hop Hopping Along?

I have a fair bit of catching up to do with this blog! A lot of things going on here since I last wrote. First, camping in Naivasha. We spent the Easter weekend again in the most amazing countryside, camping in a national game park called Hells Gate National Park. It’s named for the slot canyon called Hell’s Gate Gorge. We hiked through it which was amazing! Here are a bunch of photos taken there. Remember you can click these images to see a larger view which might be helpful

We drove from Nairobi thru the Rift Valley to Naivasha, breathtaking views and no guard rails!
















Gigantic escarpments are everywhere in the park, it’s still an active geo-thermal area.






















Here’s Kayla helping to setup camp.



















The campsite. At the edge of one of those escarpments. Beautiful view but watch your step cuz there ain't no guard rail here either!

During the first night after the kids were asleep and we were sitting around the campfire we suddenly heard hyena calls in the distance. Hyenas are mostly scavengers BUT if they are desperate they will hunt. Shortly after we heard it again, this time very very close to camp. We decided to call it a night. Kayla and I raced to the tent but I couldn’t get the zipper opened on the f’ing tent door!!! I fumbled and cursed it in the dark while Kayla ‘encouraged’ me to hurry the hell up! Nothing ever happened and we never saw a hyena the three nights we were there. We heard it every night but we were pretty relaxed about it after the third night.





Here’s the huge escarpment we were camped on viewed from below it.

In the middle of this huge field was a lone rock
with a lone tree growing on it.

Bennie, Max, Yala and Esther, best friends. Max is an amazingly good hiker while Esther can’t be bothered and needs to be carried

Danny and Mary’s SUV has a custom made rack that can be used for sitting and viewing

animals while on safari

Getting ready to enter the gorge. We had an amazing Maasai guide named Sarit. Max made quick friends with him, he’s really fascinated with the Maasai warriors.

























While we

walked in the gorge Sarit told us if there was a flash flood he would be able to ‘hear it coming’ at least 15 minutes before the water would arrive and he knew all the emergency exits in the gorge. He told us how he had saved many people, so don’t be worried. Yea, right…

There were actually some difficult passages to hike through. Sarit carried the kids on his back through some of it. Like the place where there was a 20 foot drop and a hot springs waterfall running through it. Frankly I can’t believe I hiked it through myself!

There was a place we saw a dead antelope of some sort, about a week old. Sarit said a lion had killed it. Now we were all told there were no lions in this park which is why I agreed to go camping there. Guess what, there are no ‘resident’ lions, only visiting ones! We all looked at each other wide eyed. Sarit told us the lions didn’t like the sulfur smell in the area so they never stayed around. That was reassuring…not!








We stopped at a place where red ochre was in the rocks. Sarit explained some of the Maasai warrior face painting while he applied it to Esther and Max.

Queen Esther getting carried, again, on a hike the next day. Man, I was really sore from the Hell’s Gate hike!

Lunch break at the top of the mountain.

This beautiful cave has been a special place for thousands of years for humans to mine obsidian stones which were everywhere imbedded in the walls and rock in the area

Zebra at dusk