Postscript

To celebrate my birthday this year we made a short visit to the Lake Nakuru national park.  It is just a couple of hours from our home in Nairobi.  We stayed in a lodge in the park at a discount because so many people had canceled due to ash over Europe.  Our first evening, there seemed to only be one other family, but by the day we left the lodge had filled up again.  It’s amazing to think that the volcano in Iceland was effecting hotels in Kenya!

Lake Nakuru is known for its pink flamingos.  It and Lake Elementaita, a neighboring lake, have so many flamingos they look like they have pink rims and pink islands from a distance. While we were at the park, we were able to drive to the lake front.  It was amazing to see so many flamingos.  A hyena came by while we were looking at them. They kept a safe distance.

We saw all kinds of animals in the park.  We even were able to drive near several rhinos.  One seemed a little annoyed by our presence.  It kept staring at us and running back and forth behind the car with its tail up.  We decided to drive away instead of provoking it further–could have been a great story…with an unhappy ending!

Our real adventure was getting the car stuck in some mud on an obscure path in the park.  Jeff had to get out of the car to figure out how to get us out.  There was mud everywhere.  While I was steering and pushing on the gas, I kept hoping no predators were nearby!  We got out of the mud thanks to Jeff’s good thinking.  His clothes suffered a little in the process.

Just before we left we saw seven lions on a hill looking out towards the lake; five of them appear in the picture above.  We drove up close to them.  I was thinking about how we’d gotten stuck–would we get stuck by the lions?  They paid no attention to us…and we didn’t get stuck.

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