Another great link: Walking Humanity's footsteps.

     One man, one journey, 7 years, 21,000 miles.

     We have traveled a lot as you can tell from my blogs. But there are certain places that we will not go for several reasons. One is that we are getting older and we need some medical providers nearby on our trips so we have to stay in fairly civilized regions. Secondly, my husband is a sabra, a born Israeli and therefore there are some countries that we will not be able to travel to due to basic danger to us. So there will be many parts of this earth we will not be able to reach, and many stories about meeting people that we will not be able to tell.

     Now I have found a replacement for these places which we will not be able to visit. The National Geographic Magazine of December this year begins the story of Paul Salopeck, a journalist who plans to walk the 21,000 miles from the birthplace of humanity in the Great Rift Valley of Ethiopia, over a seven year time period, following the footsteps of 60,000 years of human beings' diaspora. The first article to me was mesmerizing, his walking with a guide, two camels and their "mahouts" (a Southeast Asian word for elephant handlers)  out into the Afar dessert from Herto Bouri, Ethiopia. This location is the site of the Middle Awash Project, an archaeological dig, really a human boneyard, where some of the oldest human bones have been found. Paul and his camel handlers and another local who was his logistician then crossed the Afar desert and reached the Gulf of Aden. There is a map in the National Geographic which shows Paul's planned route, all the way around the world to Tierra del Fuego at the tip of South America. The fascinating thing is that there is a website called outofeden.nationalgeographic.com in which you can follow Paul's walk over the next 7 years. You can follow his dispatches on Twitter:@outofedenwalk. I am excited. These links will allow this peripatetic author to travel to parts of the world even I could never go to and also to view parts of the world where we have been through this journalist's eyes. And I can do this from my lounge chair. Wonderful!

     Paul is making dispatches every 3 to 4 days with photos, often with videos. The URL for the first of these National Geographic dispatches is: http://outofedenwalk.nationalgeographic.com/2013/03/26/the-glorious-boneyard-a-report-from-our-starting-line/
Paul Slopeck has already been walking since January 10 (my birthday) 2013. He has just now in December, 2013 walked into Jordan from Saudi Arabia. There are two sites where you can follow him online:
The National Geographic site above: http://outofedenwalk.nationalgeographic.com/2013

The second site includes a small video at various milestones, an interview with the closest human being at that milestone. The walk has now reached 16 milestones. This site has more structure designed for teachers and small children. This website is: http://www.outofedenwalk.com/

There are also various offshoots and articles written about these places through which Paul is walking. This undertaking of walking 21,000 miles in 7 years is funded by National Geographic Magazine. There have already been some TV stories about it and stories written in various local newspaper publications. There will no doubt be much more as time goes on.

I recommend visiting the two websites most recently listed above. And if you want to start from the very beginning, (A Very Good Place to Start), I suggest using the first URL above which describes the Middle Awash Project, an archaeological dig which has discovered the oldest hominid skeletons so far found in the world, dating back 4.4 million years. As I indicated above, Paul Salopeck chose this site to begin his mind bending long trek because it was as close as our knowledge of early human history can put us to the "Garden of Eden."

It will take a while for you to just catch up to where Paul is now in Jordan, but it is worth reading all the comments that people have left. Some are inane and can be skipped but often Paul actually answers a comment from wherever he is that has cell phone connections and he often adds wonderful little tidbits to his more formal dispatch. I can identify with him trying to find a cell phone connection in the wilds of Ethiopia and the Saudi dessert. During our trip to Kenya and Tanzania, we often stuck our phone into the air to try to get a few bars of signal. And even in the middle of the Serengeti National Park, the guides knew where to stop for a possible connection. They had phone calls to make and we occasionally used the opportunity to post a text on our travel journal.

I am planning on following Paul on his long journey for the next 6 years. If you haven't picked up the December issue of National Geographic, I suggest you do so and read the opening article about his trek and view the magnificent photos.

In the spirit of the Holiday Season, here's hoping that our journey "Out of Eden" will lead us toward world peace and understanding between all the great religious traditions.

The Masai: National Geographic Info

     The new National Geographic Magazine arrived in the mail yesterday. My mother subscribes to the magazine for me and I usually read through the entire magazine. I love the reports about strange places and strange nature that my husband and I have often seen in our travels. There was a little page blurb in the December magazine showing a Masai junior warrior doing the famous Masai jump. (See my post from 11/7/2013 on this blog.) But this photo is accompanied by a very interesting story about the Masai and their worldwide fame.

     Surprising to me was the fact that worldwide there are 80 products which include even expensive items such as cars, clothing and jewelry that carry the name of this tribe. I have not seen advertisements for these products but I would guess that images of these famous warriors are used to sell these items. If no images, for sure the worldwide known stature of this Kenyan and Tanzanian tribe are used. But as indicated by Isaac Ole Tialolo, speaking for the Masai Intellectual Property Initiative, no one has asked the Masai's permission to so use their name, reputation, and indeed their branding to sell these products.
     This Initiative organization is now reaching out to all the clans of the 3 million strong Masai nation, to elect an authorizing council to review requests to use this Masai branding and to review those products that already use the name. The plan would be similar to what our southwestern Navajo have done. Any merchandise that has been approved by the Council would bear a certificate that it is either manufactured and produced by Masai themselves, or their design and name has been officially approved by this Initiative. "As the cultural owners, we want respect," says Tialolo. "We want to protect our heritage, our name, our image."
     Article by Johanna Rizzo.



Here you can see the beadwork that the warriors
wear, around the neck, the wrist, and the waist. These
two guides are serving us the morning coffee break.
They are also wearing the olive green fleece sweaters
 of the Kenyan National Guide Service



Here is the rustic Masai beadwork store at Porini Amboselli Camp.

The beadwork inside the Masai store.

     When we were in Kenya and Tanzania, we purchased a few things that were definitely of Masai origin. At Porini Amboselli Camp there was a small rustic store which was selling particularly beadwork done by the women of the local Masai village. I actually purchased a beautiful orange multistranded necklace which I like very much for just the equivalent of $11.00, and my husband got a beaded collar. As you can see from the accompanying photos the Masai warriors all wear many forms of beaded work, but mostly around the neck and around the waist. These items could easily be branded Masai just as the Navajo silver jewelry is branded.

     Also the Masai make walking sticks and shields. Of course they also make their famous spears but I didn't see any of those for sale in the Masai store at Porini. There were some shields for sale. And in other souvenir shops along the way there were shields, and drums which might have come from some of the Masai tribes.





More beadwork.


African shields, maybe of Masai design.

Drum set.



        

This is the necklace I purchased at the Porini store. It is just
made of glass beads and brass couplings, but it certainly
involved a lot of hours of labor to string all of these beads.
I found it quite attractive and am wearing it often.

The Masai -- Tribal Traditions Continue!

     In a previous posting, I described how various Masai tribes have held onto their traditions, but have also entered into cooperative agreements to allow several wildlife Conservancies to be created in Kenya along the Masai Mara National Reserve, and along Amboselli National Park and in a few other locations in Kenya.  These conservancies have been created in the last 10 to 12 years and have expanded the percentage of Kenyan land that is protected in some way for wildlife from just 8% to 15%. There is no doubt that this has had a huge benefit on tourism and numbers of wild animals in the country of Kenya. It is quite interesting that as you drive from Masai land that is being grazed extensively and cross the border onto a Conservancy, the visible effect is almost instantaneous. In the distance of a tenth of a mile, you move from seeing the huge herds of cattle and goats with their Masai herdsmen, to seeing a breeding herd of Grant's gazelles, then giraffes, then impala, and so on. The change is indeed instantaneous.
      After our stays at Porini Lion Camp, and Porini Mara Camp, and after one night staying near Lake Nakuru National Park, in a lodge, we then moved on to Porini Amboselli Camp, further south in Kenya. We were still in Masai territory and at this camp, all employees including the director and the chef were Masai. In addition to traveling into Amboselli National Park known for its huge numbers of elephants, we were able to visit a traditional Masai village. One of the employees of the Porini camp acted as our guide. I have some gorgeous photos of this visit. And the visit allows me to narrate what we learned about the Masai traditions.


Much of the village has turned out to welcome us, all dressed in their finest.

Birds of Eastern Africa

     I love to watch birds, and Eastern Africa was a wonderful place to do just that. The birds are absolutely beautiful and they are everywhere. Over the years my birdwatching on all of our trips has turned my husband into an excellent bird photographer. I am thinking of sending some of these photos to birding magazines because I think some of the photos could earn a little money.  I have posted a few of my husband's photos here to just wet your appetite. Remember these photos are copyright protected. I have reduced their pixels for this purpose.  It will take more than one post to show all these nice photos. I am also in the process of counting the lifers that I added on this trip. I have to look through my journal from the trip, also identify all the photos my husband took of birds, and I also need to go through my bird book and remind myself if I forgot to note any bird that I did see down in my journal. My memory is pretty good for the birds I have seen, immediately the day of the sightings. But sometimes I need the bird book to jog my memory when some days have passed from the sighting.



African pied crow: A common bird especially in areas of human habitation, as you can tell from its perch.

 

     The above photo is just to wet your appetite for bird photos. Hit "Read More" and view many more.

Porini Lion Camp, Olare Orok Conservancy, Kenya.

     Our first destination in Kenya, was Porini Lion Camp in the Narok Region, located in the Olare Orok Conservancy adjacent to Masai Mara National Reserve. Like all the Porini camps, this is permanently tented. It consists of 10 bedroom tents each with its own bathroom with a flushing toilet, a shower cubicle, and sink, some storage shelves, a desk in the bedroom, and two beds. There is electricity of a dim nature because it is provided by solar  energy and generator. Due to its dimness, you often want to use a flashlight or headlight to brighten things and certainly if you wish to read after dark. The running water is not for drinking and is cold. For hot showers the Masai housekeepers bring two large pails of hot water from their burner and fill a plastic bucket which is then hoisted up a pole to provide force for a hot shower. At the end of a dusty long day out looking for game, this shower is mighty welcome. In the morning, the staff comes to the tent with a wake up "Good Morning," and the  hot beverage of your choice, with a pitcher of hot water for washing face and hands in the morning.  There is a large dining tent adjoining a lounge area with a small library. There is a separate tent office for the director and sometimes it is in this office that plugins to charge camera and other types of batteries are located. Many camps have a WiFi hotspot by chance, and occasionally cell phone service can be obtained in that hot spot. At Porini Lion Camp it was under the so-called magic tree. It seems that this was likely the highpoint in camp. However, I could not get my phone to work there. Located away from these tents are a kitchen tent, and then even further away the tents that house the workers.
     We arrived in the early afternoon after driving from Nairobi. We had a late lunch by the small creek that runs along the edge of camp while watching baboons across the creek. At 4 PM we went out on our first game drive in Kenya. Believe me, this first drive set a high standard that would be very hard for other campsites to beat. The name of the Porini camp bore its moniker well -- we saw lots of big cats, and the most fascinating views into the lives of these cats occurred with the lions.

Be sure to open this one up to "Read More." It may take a while to load because there are many photos and a rather extended video.

Kenya and Tanzania: Introduction!

     My husband and I just returned from 19 days in Kenya and Tanzania, a somewhat difficult trip which included stays at 6 permanent tented camps and 4 lodges throughout various conservancies, national parks of Kenya and Tanzania and private game reserves. The positives of this trip far outweighed the negatives, but it was still a difficult trip, with long days in safari vehicles on perhaps the most consistently horrible roads that we have encountered on any of our visits to 91 different countries. Yes there were individual roads, for example in Costa Rica, and the one to Sani Pass in Lesotho that were worse, but these were in limited areas. The roads in Kenya and Tanzania's bush are universally and consistently horrible. There is really no consistent attempt to bring in gravel, or to grade them, and many are just dirt tracks which the rainy season turns into absolute quagmires which then dry to be a combination of hillocks and potholes that require even the 4 wheel drive safari vehicles to go very slow and time the acceleration just right to get past each such segment. My bottom became very sore, from the bumping and sliding that you do inside the vehicle hitting each of these potholes. There is a lot of ground to cover inside these large national parks and plots of land, so some degree of speed has to be maintained. One day I even took the tent bed pillow with me to help cushion the shocks.

The Great Rift Valley in the highlands of Kenya.

 



      Sometimes I kidded our guides: "You are familiar with the beautiful Great Rift Valley. Well, there is a Lesser Rift Valley opening up right in the middle of this road." They would always politely laugh.

A typical road across the Masai Mara National Reserve in Kenya.

    Just when I would think that I wanted to go back to camp, there would be an animal vignette which touched my heart and I would forget about my sore bottom and just enjoy. I plan to present some of these vignettes in words and photos over the next few postings on this blog, so stay tuned to Renaissance Woman Retired blogsite for more information.

A heard of impala grazing near our tent in Porini Lion Camp.

Grant's gazelle near our camp. Very attractive ungulates.

Giraffes were absolutely everywhere.

Hippos near the Mara River.

     Perhaps I should comment on some recent world happenings that centered in Nairobi, Kenya and how they affected us. Though we spent almost no time in the city of Nairobi itself, we did fly into Nairobi and spend a night at what used to be a Holiday Inn in the city. Actually it was only about 5 hours because our plane arrived at about midnight and by the time we got our baggage and proceeded through the entry procedures, and got to our hotel it was about 1:30 AM and we were being picked up at 7 AM the next morning to begin our travels. We had a lot of miles to make that first day, heading for the Olare Orok Conservancy adjacent to the Masai Mara Game Reserve in northwestern Kenya for a two night stay in a tented camp with game drives in the Conservancy and into the Masai Mara. We also flew out of Nairobi about 2 1/2 weeks later, and 1 day after the end of the siege and destruction of the modern mall by Somali terrorists in downtown Nairobi. We were in Tanzania while much of this tragedy occurred but we were concerned about how procedures at the airport might have changed due to the tragedy and we also had a vague sense of unease just because again terrorism had struck down innocent people just going about their normal day to day business, having harmed no one to so deserve death and injury.

     First of all, the Nairobi International Airport had a major fire occur in August, 2013. It was not thought to be any kind of terrorism, but foul play has not been ruled out. It started in the immigration department in the very early morning hours when the airport was inactive. There is some contention that it was an attempt to burn records that might show all the illegal immigration that has been occurring there, perhaps people and items that are coming or going with knowledge of local authorities but without the proper documents and approval. At any rate, whatever the cause, with some questioned delays in fire department response, almost the entire airport building was gutted. One small wing of gates survived and that is now used for some departures and waiting areas. Many departures wait in a small room in the basement of that surviving wing and then are bused to tents as their airplanes pull up to the tents. Arrivals, immigration and customs are in another tent. I think the airport would be a relatively easy target the way it is now set up, but I don't know what the security around the perimeter is like. I did notice a lot of people, who didn't seem to have a particular job, but wearing the yellow jackets of airport personnel around those tents and airplanes, so perhaps there was an increase in security. The President of Kenya had announced after the mall incident that security at the airport had been increased.

      Of course, all this takes place in Nairobi, a crime ridden city where some statistics say a car is hijacked 10 times a day, just to obtain the car. Our US State Department has a long list of cautions and does not recommend taking any public transportation in the city. The mustatas ( small mini vans that serve as public buses) are often subjected to robberies. Muggings and purse snatching, even walking into hotels and forcing the staff at gunpoint to open the safes in the lobby for robbery are not uncommon. Many crimes are not even reported because people do not trust the police force. In fact, sometimes scams are run by people masquerading as police, and yet it is difficult to prevent this because police regularly run check points and all vehicles must stop at the checkpoint. How is one to know which are criminals and which are the legal police? I think we were safe all the time because we were patrons of Gamewatchers' Safaris, a reputable tourist firm. We were picked up at the airport as we exited by two young men holding our name and with papers describing our trip and with particulars that only Gamewatchers' people could know. We had to drive to our hotel at about 1 AM in the morning, but again there were two young men with us. Our hotel had a gated parking lot and security personnel at that gate. We felt safe there. The warnings also say that there is banditry also in the national parks and reserves, including the Masai Mara, but it does state that mostly people who are traveling on their own are at risk. Our guides always had a short wave radio and are in contact with the other tourist vehicles. And we had two Masai warriors as guide and driver. We always felt safe. At the tourist entrances and rest areas that we stopped, there were lots of people, but clearly most were tourists and their guides. I must admit that I had not read the extent of crime on the Internet until I prepared for this article. But I always felt safe in Kenya because we were with reputable guides, and also in Tanzania.

Our tent at Porini Mara Camp.

Inside the tent. The bathroom and shower are behind the central curtain.

    Again it should be strongly stated that once out of Nairobi, we had no reason to feel fear. In Kenya, we traveled with Gamewatchers' Safaris between camps. They took great care of us. All transfers were there waiting for us and got us exactly to where we were to meet someone from a Conservancy camp, or a driver to take us to the next site. The vehicles were well marked and identifiable.  We stayed in three Porini camps: Porini Lion Camp, Porini Mara Camp, and Porini Amboselli Camp. These permanent tented camps are located in several private Game Conservancies scattered along the edge of the Masai Mara National Game Reserve, and along Amboselli National park near Mt. Kilimanjaro.

     I need to explain the origin of these Conservancies, which has come about just in the last 10 to 15 years. The Kenyan National game and tourism authorities, various international foundations, and some internationally known biologists joined forces and persuaded the local Masai tribes who own the land to give up grazing their large herds of cattle and goats on the land, and to give the land over to wildness for the wildlife. Previously the land had been terribly overgrazed and there were few if any wild animals. Agreements and contracts were drawn up that pay rent to the Masai elders for their tribes for the use of the land by wildlife and small private tourist camps which are very limited in scope. Restrictions are placed on the density of these camps, both in the total acreage that each camp must have, and a limit of 10 tents per camp. This limits the number of tourist vehicles that are thus driving through the conservancies. Also there were agreements to employ the Masai in the camps. Indeed, each of the Porini camps employ almost entirely Masai men as housekeepers for the tents, cooks and servers, guards, drivers and guides. Only the camp director, head of security and chef may be non Masai, and in Lion Camp Mara everyone is Masai including the director and the chef. These young Masai men, wearing their traditional shuka robes, took extremely good care of us. They all spoke some English. They cooked us delicious food and presented and served it with poise. It didn't take them long to learn what we liked in our coffee and how we liked our eggs prepared in the morning. They gently awoke us with a soft Good Morning, outside our tent in the morning, carrying a tray of our selected hot morning beverage. The security detail patrolled the camp grounds during the night making sure that we were not endangered by wild animals that were not monitored and observed to make sure they were not marauding. These tall Masai young men drove our tour vehicles skillfully on those terrible roads, and guided us with amazing knowledge of nature and everything in these wild places. The guides go to the equivalent of 2 years of college and then require a 3 year internship in the field. They continue to educate themselves moving through three levels of guiding, the Bronze, the Silver, and the Gold. One of our guides was working toward his gold Level. In addition to the exam to pass into the next level, for the Gold level, the applicant must have an individual research project. Our guide's project was working with rhinos. He had spent 2 years at Porini Camp Rhino, where he had worked with animals brought from the San Diego Wildlife Reserve, where they had not succeeded with encouraging the breeding of a threatened subspecies of white rhinoceros, the Northern White Rhino.

     While in Tanzania, we were in the capable hands of a single guide/driver working with one of the larger touring companies in Tanzania, the Leopard Tours. Our guide, Innocent M. was charming, funny, and very knowledgeable. He worked hard to ensure that we could observe every animal possible in the various Tanzanian National Parks: Serengeti, Ngorongoro Crater, Lake Manyara, and Tarangire National Park. We also spent two nights at a Singita Camp in the Grumeti Game Reserve, privately owned by Singita. We were at one of their 5 lodgings in the private game reserve, Faru Faru. I will do a separate description of that place. It was fabulous. There we had the Singita guides. They do not allow outside guides to drive their private roads. And those roads are graded and maintained. Of course, this was a very expensive place to stay, but no limits on money, I would send all tourists to Faru Faru. It was a phenomenal place.
     Our trip included a visit to an authentic Masai village and I will outline that visit with photos in a separate posting coming up.

Our safari vehicle of Porini Mara Camp. We joined up with another Porini
 vehicle to have a bush breakfast. It will become obvious in the next photo.

We parked in this yellow barked acacia grove for breakfast.

 



Our Masai guides setting out the breakfast for us that Porini cooks sent along.

You can see we did not miss anything at this breakfast.

Our Masai taking their turn at breakfast. It was delicious.

     This was a phenomenal trip and it will keep us busy on this site for several postings. My husband is just about done sorting out all his photos and I will be able to access them to punctuate my narrative with actual views of some of what we saw. Certainly if anyone has any questions, email me or enter a comment on these posts and I will answer to the best of my ability.

There is another tradition in the Masai Mara. During the late afternoon game drive, the guides have some favorite high
places where we stop and have what is traditionally known as "Sundowners". That is we watch the sun go down while
snacking and sipping on cocktails. Just like the bush breakfast, the camp kitchen sends along the snacks and each of
our individual requests for a sundowner beverage. When the sun is down we drive back to camp, but often are able to see
some nocturnal animals with the red spotlight.  Wow!

    

    
    
    
 

More African Birds!

      This is Ann that is posting these photos, but they are the work of my photographer husband. I received one request for some more of these photos to be posted. I only require one request. So here are more.

Cape turtle dove

White browed robin-chat

African spoonbill

Mirabou stork

Yellow billed stork

Egyptian geese

Black ibis

Pair of Pied kingfishers

Great grey heron

African jacana

Wire tailed swallow

long toed lapwing

glossy ibis

wattled lapwing

open billed stork

African skimmer

Red billed oxpecker on Cape buffalo

Cape White eye

Grey headed gull

That's it. A good mix, I think. Most are fairly large birds that sit still in order to be photographed. But here and there my husband caught a good picture of a small bird. And it was those photos that helped me identify the bird to get them on my life list.