Easter Weekend at Lake Naivasha

This past Easter holiday provided four days off work and the opportunity for six of us VSO types to spend three nights at Lake Naivasha. It would be an action packed weekend, including a boat trip to view hippos and other wildlife, cycling and hiking in Hells Gate National Park amongst the zebras, buffaloes, warthogs and Gazelles, and hiking to the top of Mount Longonot, a dormant volcano. A nice relaxing and safe weekend, all in all.

It has been said that half the fun is getting there. While this might be true, it definitely seems like half the time is spent in getting there. Frank (from Holland) and I hiked Mount Longonot on the Sunday and it took about 5-hours travelling 50 km-return by matatu (mini-bus) and on foot to get from our Lodge to the park gates and back. The hike itself took about 4 ½ hours. I was prepared for this scenario, but I wasn’t expecting how crowded our matatu would get. These things are licensed to carry 13 passengers, but on Sundays the police aren’t out on the roads checking the vehicles. At one point they managed to squeeze in a total of 25 people (including driver and conductor) and I was starting to feel very claustrophobic. What saved me was sticking my head out the side window.

Once we reached the park gates the hike to the volcano rim only took about 45-minutes. However, after the first stage we still had a lot of walking to do as the volcano floor was 2 ½ km across and the path around the rim was 8 km. The hike was really worth the effort as we were rewarded with fantastic views and virtually had the place to ourselves. As an added bonus, I saw my first family of giraffes.

Our boat trip on Lake Naivasha to see the hippos was actually split over two days. We initially set-out on the Friday afternoon, not long after our arrival. Unfortunately, we weren’t far into it when a major rainfall began. Our guide offered to take us back to shore and try the trip again the next morning. We thought that he was just being really nice, but would later learn that when it rains he can’t see the bubbles coming from hippos that are under water (apparently, they can hold their breath for 30 minutes).

The boat trip the next morning was a great success as we viewed hippos lounging in the lake and a variety of wildlife (gazelles, Wildebeest, Waterbucks and lots of birds). The lake wasn’t very deep and we watched one hippo as it travelled across the lake by bounding off the bottom. The outing felt very similar to whale watching off the B.C. coast. The trip was coming close to an end and we were heading for shore. Suddenly the guide veered the boat sharply; he had spotted hippo bubbles. It was only after we had reached shore that he told us about his once being capsized by a hippo five years ago.

Hell’s Gate National Park is one of the few lowland parks in Kenya that you can walk or cycle through without a guide. When we came across four buffalo on the side of the road taking a great interest in us I wasn’t so sure this was a good thing. Frank and I decided to try our luck and go past them. I didn’t think I could go faster than a buffalo, but I figured I had a reasonable shot at out-sprinting Frank. We passed them with no complications. We also hiked through a gorge area further along in the park, but the highlight for me was riding the bike. My mountain bike I rented was too small, beat-up and not all of gears worked but it was the best machine I had been on in months.

It was great to hook-up with my VSO colleagues. We had all gone through a week of training together in Nairobi upon our arrival in Kenya and all but one of us had met during training in England. The lodge we stayed at was really nice with comfortable beds, hot showers and buffet meals included at a cost of about $50 Cdn/night. Lake Naivasha was heavily booked for the holiday weekend and we had to stay here because less expensive places weren’t available. I certainly wasn’t upset and wouldn’t mind going back there again some time.