In Europe, we are familiar with the Rift Valley from several TV shows and films. It is a regular spot for filming wild life footage; a scenery that captured the essence of African wild life. It seems as if all the different animals species found in Africa can also be found in the Rift Valley. Area-wise the Rift Valley is long and wide. It is also relatively steep, falling in between some of the highest mountains of the world, including Kilimanjaro.
Our trip from Nairobi to Kisumu took place in a comfortable coach. After navigating out of Nairobi, the vegetation grew denser and you started seeing a wider variety of plants, trees and pushes. The first part of the journey was much covered with trees. Once in a while we would pull through small villages that consisted of wooden huts. There was always a local supermarket, an internet cafe and a hostel in a village. All of these public establishments had clothing hanging at the front, with posters of their services being hung at the front of them. They did not have proper front doors.
My colleague Chystel explained that there was always one person in duty in order to keep the business going and, therefore, they did not feel the need to install proper concrete doors. I tried to imagine how it would be to sleep at one of those hostels that did not look bigger in size than one room.
After the stream of the small villages, we started climbing up a mountain and entered an area with coffee and tea fields. There was plantation of small green pushes everywhere. We could see a couple of people out in the field, picking up tea leaves and coffee beans and placing them in huge baskets. There were big country houses and hotels next to the fields. Chrystel explain to me that visiting the tea and coffee harvests were one tourist attraction. Many tourist preferred to stay here rather than in cities and to be close to the wild life. At night, one needed to be careful, however. That is when the big cat animals and the snakes were more likely to be moving around, looking for food. There were stories of tourists who had encountered lions and pythons, narrowly escaping danger.
We drove along the top of the short-ish mountain. From here, we had a wonderful view of the valley. We could see Kilimanjaro in the distance, clouded in the hazy sunshine. We could see giraffes walking about in the valley and flamencos standing in the steep water that had accumulated in one part of the valley. There was something magical amount the scene. As if the creations of God were all in front of our eyes, if we just looked hard enough.
We started descending into the Valley itself. All the while, cheerful drumming and singing was filling the coach. The driver seemed to love his music and the passengers were happily grooving along. The temperature dropped as we drove into the Valley. All of us started looking for out jackets and pulling up our socks. We were getting closer and closer to the wild life.
‘There have been incident when elephants have crushed into cars’, Chrystel said as she pulled down the sleeves of her top. ‘This is why some people are scared to drive through the Valley. Also, people living in the villages in the Valley need to be careful about when they go out and collect woods. There have been incident when elephants have attacked women out in the fields collecting woods for making a fire and being able to cook.’ Chrystel shook her head. ‘People don’t have a choice. They have to live their lives, but sometimes wild life comes on the way. Like poisonous snakes. Even certain monkeys are said to be aggressive towards women.’
‘Really?’ I asked. ‘Why women?’
Chrystel laughed. ‘Who knows... perhaps they can sense that women are weaker than men or that they are more likely to give nuts to the monkeys? Animals are very instinctive, you know.’
I continued looking out the window into the Valley. I was mesmerized by the wild life that I was seeing. This was something that I would not experience when I was back in Europe.
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For more information on the Rift Valley, see:
http://geology.com/articles/east-africa-rift.shtml
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