The Hell's Gate

The place, currently is a pleasant environment, although its still called as the Hell's gate. Some say that it has been named as hell's gate since it had some connection with slavery. It is one of the rare national parks where you are allowed to take a bike ride or even a walk. After reading a few reviews which said it has predators I was wondering when walking around what would happen if a lions or cheetah jumps in for a surprise, but after getting their and seeing so many people being on foot made me realize that sightings of predators in this park is very rare.



The Caves

The caves at the Hell's gate national park, Naivasha, Kenya as I mentioned on another blog kept on reminding me the film 127. The landscapes and the formation was something similar to the Grand Canyon pictures I have seen, I might be completely wrong since I have never been to the Grand Canyon.


The landscapes

It has a beautiful variation of landscapes and taking a drive along the Savannah and taking a walk among the antelopes and zebra's is fun.



Volcanoes

The place is also home to extinct volcanoes but still the products of it our largely visible, including hot springs, lava rocks and of course the extinct volcanoes.

Hippo

Last week it was the my turn to meet the Lions, this week it was the Hippo's turn. Both these creatures are known to be brave, as per the Zulu's Hippos are even braver than the lions. Probably because of the better looks, the lions are more popular in folk lore than the hippos.

Seeing these man eaters in wild gives me a childish  excitement (but then I am a child so I should be getting that excitement). Yesterday we took a boat ride along the Naivasha Lake in Kenya, it took us to the close proximity of the herds of hippos. They put up quite a good exhibition, some carrying the young ones on the back while swimming,  some doing summersaults in the water but ending up with a huge thud and others were making a noise which was very similar to a babies cry.


The seated on a tree and watching the exhibition is a fishing eagle.


A herd at work


get off my back

Interesting African Murals

I captured the following set of murals at the crocodile farm in Nairobi. Each mural depicts a deep meaning connected with the history of Kenya and the atrocities/challenges the local communities had faced  over the years.

Mural 1: Human crocodile conflict



The picture talks about the flooding and as a result crocodiles intruding into human territory and the fatalities which occurred due to this. It depicted as if the flood has a head of a crocodile.

Mural 2: Slavery



One of the greatest insults in the history of human beings is the slavery. History says African's were used as slaves and the mural shows them being captured by Arabs and being taken to be sold. The scars of slavery and discrimination has left a bad taste on the minds of those communities. They claim that in modern day too slavery exists but it has taken different forms and its not spoken about since most if it is not done publicly now.

Mural 3: gun and love



An ironic portrait showing a preacher with the holy text in one hand and the gun on the other trying to preach the holy text to ancient people.

Mural 4: The Tsavo Lions



During the English era, they built the railway line from Uganda to Kenya to be used for easier trade related transport. For this purpose they had to clear miles of dense jungles. Inorder to get this done they brought down people from India to employ their labor. During that period two mail lions reportedly attacked and killed scores of workers (mostly Indian). These lions were supposedly Tsavo lions and they have distinct differences from usual lions. Most are said to be really good at hunting, bigger in size and sometimes the male lions are maneless.

Kenya

I walked into Kenya, with mixed feelings. I was not sure what to expect. What I had heard and read in the media about Africa was not positive. People around me asked "Are you seriously going to Africa?", these questions were adding more to the confusion. I reached Nairobi and the feeling was totally different from what I expected. It was a place much cooler than Colombo to start with. The infrastructure development was visible, it looked like a place on the rise. The shopping malls were in comparable caliber to the onces in Malaysia, which is not bad by any standards. The life style there seems to be more easy paced. It was an interesting place and totally different from what I expected.

Cheetah at the nature walk

Going Around
When in Nairobi I got a chance to visit the Nairobi national park. I think its the only national park which is within city limits. We drove around it for about 4 to 5 hours. Our mission was to find the Zimba. The Nairobi national park has only a handful of Lions and our driver picked out a male lion at a distance, in all excitement we tried to get closer, but unfortunately, the path that we took actually took us further away from the Zimba and we missed to take a click of it. But it was a place where we could spot the giraffes, dears, zebras, Ostriches, etc, rather I should say you would see them in herds and after sometime we started to completely ignore them. Anything when too much will loose its value I guess :D

Ostrich at Nairobi National Park

Adjoining the national park you could find a nature walk, which is a zoo like thing, but animals are given more space and visitors are allowed to take a walk. Here the main attraction was the Cheetah. Yours truly was seated on one side of bund and taking the pictures of the Cheetah who had come to the other edge of the bund. Suddenly the cheetah's pose reminded me of the exact pose the cat at home would do to prepare to leap from place to the other. Thank god it just dawned on us what this adorable creature was trying to do and we hurriedly made our way out of its enclosure.

Zebras at Nairobi National Park

Another place which I got to visit was the crocodile farm, I think it was an orphanage for baby crocs. This is where I learnt that discrimination happens even in the animal kingdom. All the albino crocs at the farm had visible injuries. One had a torn jaw, the other was partially blind blind and another had a deep cut. When I inquired from the keeper, he explained that it was indeed discrimination and jealousy.

Dosing at the croc farm

I have been told that I had not enjoyed the real Kenya since I haven't gone out of Nairobi. It seems a visit to Masai mara is a must for any visitor. All in all its indeed a nice place and worth a visit.