Nairobi National Park

On Sunday, I decided to take a mini safari in Nairobi National Park. Yes, there is a National Park with a safari inside the city limits. It is small as far as Kenyan National Parks go, but it was the first national park in Kenya. It has four of the "big 5" in it. The big 5 are lions, black rhinos, African elephants, leopards, and cape buffalo. The one missing from Nairobi National Park is the elephant because they eat more than the park can sustain.

I arrived at the park around 2:00 with the plan of taking the park shuttle around. It only tours the park on Sunday afternoons. My Lonely Planet said it leaves at 3:00 (but have your name on the reservation list by 2:30) and costs $20. I'm glad I got there early. It took me a while to find where the bus left from and it left at 2:30. There was no reservation list. You get on the bus, they collect your money ($50, not $20), and then it heads out. Luckily, I was able to get a window seat.

A sign I encountered on my search for the park shuttle. Adults better watch out because apparently, they do not have the right of way.

The park shuttle

Entering the park

Zebras!

Giraffes munching on a tree

More zebras and a couple of kudus (I think)

Ostrich

An airplane - not your typical sight on safari, but the airport is just east of the park.

Another ostrich

From a slightly different angle that includes the Nairobi skyline

Impala

Warthog

A bunch of female impalas, there are a couple of males hiding in there

Cape buffalo - the only one of the big 5 I saw

A menagerie of animals - male and female ostriches, zebras, and impalas

All in all, it was a fun way to spend the afternoon. If I had to do it again though, I would just hire a car and make my own mini safari. I think the entry fee to the park is $40, so it would be comparable to the park shuttle. While you would lose the tour guide, who was good, you would gain the ability to stop when and for how long you want. Plus, you'd get a better view of what was out the other side of the vehicle. I definitely missed some photo opportunities because of of those things, but I will have other opportunities. Hopefully my real safari will also include lion and elephant sitings as well.

Maasai Ostrich Resort - Nearly a Swiss Family Robinson Adventure

I escaped Nairobi today, but just barely, with my new friends Jenna and Josh. We traveled about 45km south of the city to the Maasai Ostrich Resort with the plan to ride ostriches, eat ostriches (except Jenna who is a vegetarian), tour the ostrich farm, and just plain hang out for the day. We decided to hire a driver for the day since a taxi would have been very expensive. Our hope was to get on the road between 9 and 9:30, but we got a bit of a late start. I think we were finally headed out of Nairobi by around 10:30. There are a couple of ways to get to the ostrich resort, and for some reason our driver chose the long way. The shorter way would have been more straight forward, but the longer way was more scenic. We drove out past Nairobi National Park and the Ngong hills before turning down the road that would connect us to the road the ostrich resort was off of. The roads in Kenya fascinate me. There are really smooth, what appear to be well maintained, paved sections of road interspersed with gigantic potholes and/or short stretches of dirt roads. Between our driver stopping to ask directions on several occasions (I think I felt more confident about where we were and where we needed to go than he did – thanks Lonely Planet map!) and the road conditions, it took us nearly two hours to get there.

Our first order of business once we arrived was to ask about the ostrich rides. We were told that they would be available at 2PM. All I could think at the time was at least they didn’t say we had already missed them for the day. Since we had some time to kill, we decided to hang out by the pool and get some lunch. I ordered a Coca-Cola, probably the only one I will order while I am here unless there are no other options since I’m not a big soda fan, but they use real sugar here instead of high fructose corn syrup and it does make it so much better. Josh and I perused the menu for our ostrich options and both decided on ostrich burgers. It was really good. I would definitely eat ostrich again.

My traveling companions - Josh and Jenna

While we waited for our lunch to arrive, I took some photos of Superb Starlings - they were everywhere.

My Coca-Cola

My ostrich burger

At 2PM we headed over to the ring where the ostrich rides were conducted. Since things were running on Kenya time, I don’t think an ostrich was brought into the pen until closer to 2:30. The handlers approached us and informed us that there was a weight limit. While Lonely Planet and the resort itself had failed to mention this prior to this point, we weren’t particularly surprised. Jenna and I had discussed on multiple occasions how we didn’t understand how an ostrich could possibly hold our weight with its scrawny little legs. It turns out it probably can’t since we both exceeded the weight limit. Josh was the only one of us small enough to ride the ostrich. At least one of us got to do it. Josh went and paid his 200 shillings (about $2.50), climbed in the ring, and mounted the ostrich. The ride consisted of two men acting as brakes for the ostrich and leading it around the pen once. Yep, just once, and it wasn’t a particularly large pen. Josh declared it was worth every cent.

Ride at your own risk

Josh mounting his ostrich

Made it on

There he goes!

After Josh got his ride, we went to check into getting a farm tour. There was about a 10 minute wait for the guide to return from another tour. The tour basically consisted of us following a guy from pen to pen. He was pretty quiet but did answer questions if we had them.

Wasting time while waiting for the guide of our tour.

Me with an ostrich egg. Okay, maybe it isn't so novel - you can get them at whole foods after all. One ostrich egg is equivalent to 24 chicken eggs.

Jenna with the egg.

3 day old ostrich chicks - they were so cute!

8 month old ostriches. They thought we were there to feed them.

Luckily, their bite doesn't hurt.

Josh was still skeptical though.

Adult ostriches, the males are black and the females are brown

After our tour it was nearly 4PM, so we decided we needed to head back to Nairobi. As we drove down the dirt road heading back to the main road, we could tell it was raining in the distance and would soon be raining where we were. The sky looked really cool. As we were taking pictures out of the windows of the car, Jenna spotted zebras. We stopped to enjoy our little safari moment and take a few pictures before continuing down the road. We luckily made it back to the paved road before the rain started. It rained really hard for about 15 minutes or so. We took the shorter way back, and even with the rain it only took us about an hour. We all felt relaxed and refreshed from our day outside Nairobi.

Zebras!