Sat 1st Feb

Msa- Nyali

A strange combination breakfast of mandazi, omelette and sausages. I didn’t enjoy the relatively sweet with the savoury; I would’ve much preferred plain bread. I checked out and in less than 10 minutes I was at the Nyali (Reef) stage before 9am.

Soon we were off. The conductor asked if we were okay with going straight up Links road…no detour via Reef htl….and the 3 of us agreed. I was happy as I was dropped off right by the shopping centre and it saved me a bit of a walk. I wanted to see Shadya to discuss creating an eCitizen account but she didn’t start work until 2pm.
By 09:30 I was at mama siti having a tea. Mark contacted me to say they had arrived at Tulia and was waiting for their room to be prepared. We met up at Tulia by 10:00. I was given Mt Kenya room this time; nice and big on the ground floor at the end.

I went to see Shadya about an eCitizen account.  It turned out that I already had one; I surmised it was through Charles when he got me new visas in the past. I had a feeling it would be very helpful to already have one for getting into the gamepark…and I was right. Not as easy as what was being told to Mark.
I went to Naivas, the bank and put money on mpesa. We thought we’d go to the Reef for a drink overlooking the beach, but when passing the Nest Lounge we noticed a special offer on beers sign. At 250bob it was the same price as Kenol, so we couldn’t resist. Actually, Nest is a very nice place to have a drink…no loud music and screens showing football.

I ended up at Kenol for a quick one before having a githeri for dinner at mama siti with Mark and Lewis. From there we returned to Tulia, and Mark and I had a gin snifter before I retired to my room for the night.

Sun 2nd & Mon 3rd.

Each day starts with an ‘English’ breakfast. It’s delicious and very filling, and actually too much for me, but keeps me going until the evening. The breakfast doesn’t include tea so I go to mama siti for that after my breakfast.
I went to the beach at midday and got a shock at the transformation since December. A whole top layer of about a foot of sand had been washed away to expose the coral rocks underneath.

On Sunday…
After a visit to the beach I met up with Peter the Dane (who I hung out with in Tanga), at Java Coffee.  Apart from passing the time,  there was nothing to report.
Of course we had to visit Kenol. And they have a new TV screen so watching football is more comfortable. I can’t remember what I had for dinner…something with rice?
Oh, I finally met up with Afnan and had a good chat at Kenol.  We went to the off licence,  but she only wanted a packet of fags to take home.

On Monday,  the same routine basically. Mark booked our SGR tickets on line for Msa to Voi on Tuesday. I went to the beach.
I’m always keeping on top of my clothes washing of course.
We went to Nest Lounge, knowing that the offer on beers was still available.  Also, if it is too hot, they have fans. From there we went to Kenol, where John joined us later. John is good company, and of course he helps me get the room price reduction at Tulia. 
He also showed me an article about Tanzania changing its currency notes. I thought it was all of them but maybe only the 2,000bob note. It’s good to be forewarned though. Afnan didn’t make it, as planned, and I don’t know what happened with her.
I had chicken biryani for dinner at mama siti and then went back to Tulia. A snifter outside Mark’s room, and then to my room to pack to be ready for an 06:00 departure to the SGR.
A good 3 days in Nyali. Exceedingly hot though; the more normal January temperatures have resumed in February.

Tues 4th Feb

Voi – Tsavo House

We were picked up by Yusuf in his taxi at 06:00 to take us to the SGR Terminus. We arrived at 06:30. We arrived a bit too early, but it was nice to take our time over the very hot tea. Oh, the system was a bit different, in that the luggage was left on the conveyor belt while you went to the office to print your ticket before going through security.
Mark got all our tickets as he’d paid fir them. It was nice to linger over the tea before heading to the train.

The train seating has been changed so that all the seats face forward i.e. no longer two rows of seats facing each other. We left bang on 08:00 and arrived at Voi station at 09:49.

Juma was there to meet us and took shopping in town at Bafagih supermarket for noodles,bread,sausages, eggs jam,butter,juice…then next door at Jai Hari supermarket for a couple of bottles of spirit. I also went to a covered market for vegetables incl onions,tomatoes, green peppers, chillies,coriander. The reason being that Tsavo House was a self catering ABnb.

Then we went on what should’ve been a 10 minute drive…but took more like 20 minutes due to the rough road…to Tsavo House and were met by Chris the owner (Kenya born with a long Kenya family history). The ‘quirky’ hacienda style house is only 7 years old,  with 2 bedrooms upstairs and 1 bedroom downstairs.

We settled in. I went for a short walk to the river at the bottom of the garden, passing lots of monkeys playing in the trees along the way. The grass is deliberately left uncut in order to attract insects and butterflies etc, so the garden has a lovely wild feel about it.

I think we had an omelette and toast for lunch. I know that for the evening I cooked sausages, noodles and vegetables; I really enjoyed the opportunity to do some cooking in a well equipped kitchen.

Otherwise, the rest of the day was just relaxing/chilling at the very comfortable house. I had paid Chris my $40 per day…about 11,700Ksh for the 2 days. I took a few nice sunset pics from my bedroom. We must’ve started on the bottle of Chrome in the late afternoon, and that saw us through to the evening.

I had a very comfortable night’s sleep. We had an early start for the gamepark…by 06:30 or 07:00 I think. I thought we would be heading in the direction of Taita Hills/Salt Lick, but we went back into Voi and into Tsavo East; the area I travelled through over 4 years ago.

Wed 5th Feb

We wasted half an hour at the Gate because their systems were down. We saved a bit of time by charging our 3 entrance fees onto my eCitizen account, so I was glad I already had one. Mark and I paid 52Usd each, while Lewis was only about 580Ksh. Mark paid John the driver the 100Usd for the hire of the minibus for the morning. We sorted out the individual cost later. But my 35Usd for a whole morning’s safari was excellent value.

Well, we had an amazing 4 hours or so in the Park. Fairly early on we saw lions. A little bit far off and not doing much, but fun to see. Then zebra, and lots of giraffe close up. There were buffalo too, but what we were really missing was elephants. 

After driving quite a long way and enjoying the landscape,  we hit the jackpot. We stopped at a dam/pool as a herd of 4 elephants came from a short distance away headed in our direction. They came to drink and wallow and play in the water. They jostled and ‘fought’ and chased each other…amazing to watch for about 30 minutes. What a treat as I had never seen elephants playing in water before.

Well, what a way to end the morning.  We headed back to the Gate and back to Tsavo House. We were all hungry for lunch of omelette and noodles and toast.
After lunch I walked down to the river again…not much to see really, apart from the monkeys playing in the trees.

The setting of Tsavo House was forcing me to relax, which was a good thing. We had a relaxing afternoon before starting on the Chrome again. Then I disappeared into the kitchen to start preparing our dinner…well, the same dinner…of sausages, noodles, vegetables etc.

Again, a very relaxed evening. I even had to start on the County….  A great couple of days for about £62 accommodation and £27 Park minibus hire. Msa and Voi taxis cost about £10. We had an amazing time.