Many apologies for the silence thus far.
A brief update:
We arrived at Ol Pej after a grueling journey (two
eight-hour flights, overnight in a hotel, 4 hour taxi ride to Mpala, packing up
the cars, and then an hour drive to arrive at Ol Pejeta just before dark). The
first week was spent getting set up and getting over jetlag. The second week
was spent mostly on car trouble for me. First I found out that the spare I was
given didn’t fit the car (you can guess where & when I figured that out…),
then that the gas cap was locked and I didn’t have the key. On the way back
from picking up an appropriate spare, the exhaust pipe fell off and the wheel
bearing on a back wheel broke, leaking differential oil all over the wheel.
Getting all this fixed in town cost me 3 more days of repairs back at Kamok (Ol
Pejeta’s on-site workshop) where the Kamok mechanics attempted to undo the
damage done by the town mechanics. Sigh. The car seems to be running okay now,
though (knock on wood).
There was an upside to the car trouble: I was at the right
place at the right time and was able to hop in car to join Ol Pejeta and KWS
staff in a lion collaring expedition. Ol Pejeta puts radio collars on some of
its lions to assist in lion monitoring (and to enable lion tracking safaris for
tourists). The time had come to collar some new lions, which requires that they
be darted and tranquilized. This allows for an up close and personal lion
experience (photos courtesy of Ed Barthorp):
Definitely a good distraction from my car troubles!
More stories to come soon. Meanwhile, keep an eye out for photos posted here.
No comments:
Post a Comment