4 Weeks in Kenya

Holy Hippos!!

Sunday was our day off so we started off a bit later for breakfast and then headed into Navaisha for a church service at the Bread of New Life Ministries. Everyone was very welcoming and we were greeted by singing and dancing on the stage – kinda exactly what we were expecting. When we the last time you actually you felt comfortable dancing in church?? We went up to the stage to introduce ourselves to the congregation. The Bishop of the church welcomed us and then a female pastor did a sermon – we're pretty sure she said 'Praise be to God' after every two words. Definitely an interesting experience.

After the 'Holy' part of our day, we headed to the 'Hippos' part of our day. We drove to Lake Navaisha and took a boat tour around the lake. Navaisha means 'moving water' and the lake is 170 square km. There are tonnes of birds on the lake – over 360 different species. They had papyrus plants surrounding the lake, which were beautiful. We were on the hunt for hippos and we saw quite a few!! They weren't "out" of the water, but you could at least see their heads. There were some men wading in the water fishing – seems crazy to me as although hippos are herbivores they are known to be one of the most dangerous animals in Africa. They weigh approximately 2 tonnes and can outrun a human!

After our boat tour and lunch we headed to check out the hot springs. On our way we saw lots of animals – giraffes, zebras, baboons, small monkeys, gazelle, impalas, warthogs and wildebeest!

It was good training for our safaris next week as every time we saw something we were so excited that we would shout out – we must remember to be quiet so we don't scare away the animals. Unfortunately the road to the hot springs was washed out so we headed back to our guesthouse for the evening.

Tomorrow is our last day at Maai Mahiu...