Safari Stories

The centuries-old ruins on Kirepwe Island near on Mida Creek, Watamu of a sultanate that once was

Kirepwe Island on Mida Creek, Watamu

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Exploring ancient ruins

By Rupi Mangat

The plan is to have a feast of all things oceanic at the Crabshack at Dabasso Creek on the greater Mida Creek. I wade in the shallow water of the mangrove-lined creek to the dug-out canoe past village kids splashing around for a sunset sail on the water before the feast.

Local fishers' canoes on Mida Creek Watamu
Local fishers’ canoes on Mida Creek Watamu Copyright Rupi Mangat

Kahindi Charo – my local gondolier takes the oar and pushes the canoe into deeper waters while l enjoy the ocean-swept breeze (like a diva). The water turns deep blue in the mangrove-lined waterways splashed with a streak of gold of the setting sun. Charo is also a bird-guide and manager of Crabshack, the community-owned restaurant which you enter along a raised platform through a mangrove forest.

With the rising tide, the sand banks disappear and birds of many feathers – ospreys, yellow-billed storks, Goliath herons – settle on the mangroves to roost. A man on a surfboard with twenty-litre jerry cans sets off from Dabasso Creek to the island of Kirepwe. “It’s twenty minute away,” tells Charo. We make a date for the following morning to sail there because Charo tells of ancient ruins on the island – a sort of a ‘mini’ Gede.

Stunning Sunset Mida Creek Copyright Rupi Mangat
Kahindi Charo my local gondolier on Mida Creek Watamu Copyright Rupi Mangat
Local man on surf board with 20-litre jery canns rowing to Kirepwe Island at sunset Copyright Rupi Mangat
Crabshack Mida Creek for delicious sea-fest Copyright Rupi Mangat

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Red Rocks community centre by Virunga National Park in Rwanda.

Musanze Caves in Rwanda

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Exploring Musanze Caves, Buhanga Eco-Park and Red Rocks Community Camp

Published Saturday magazine, Nation newspaper 3 December 2016

Musanze caves near Virunga National Park in Rwanda.
Musanze caves near Virunga National Park in Rwanda. Copyright Maya Mangat

Basking in the afterglow of having been in the company of the critically endangered Mountain gorillas on the high slopes of Volcanoes National Park in north-western Rwanda, we’re now in the belly of the ancient caves that are a product of the fiery volcanic drama of the volcanic Virungas. In Kinyarwanda, Virunga is the word for volcano.

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puff adder

Snakes and Blunders

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The 10th Bio-Ken International Snakebite Seminar, Watamu

Published Daily Nation 29 November 2016

Useful Snake contacts in Kenya: 0718 290324 Bio-Ken Snake Farm www.bioken.com  www.antivenomtrust.com   www.snakebiteinitiative.org

13-year-old Menza Benjamin was picking up cashewnuts on the ground when he felt a burning hot bite on his leg followed by another. He started to vomit and broke out in a cold sweat. Close to his hut he fainted. He never saw the snake.

That was three years ago and he’s lucky to be alive, sitting at the snakebite seminar held in Watamu early November.

green mamba
Royjan and Boniface who had been called by these villagers to catch a snake in the roof of one of their huts. It was a green mamba. Royjan and Boniface took some time to talk to them and answer their questions. Picture copyright Royjan Taylor

What saved Menza was the speed with everything that followed. His uncle saw him and immediately put him on a pikipiki and took him 12 kilometers to the Bio-Ken Snake Farm.  By the time they reached the snake farm, the boy was already showing rapidly advancing symptoms of black mamba bite. He was rushed by car – along with a supply of suitable antivenom to the local private hospital where he was treated by the hospital’s founder, Dr. Erulu, also present at the seminar.

Black mambas are among the fastest and deadliest snakes in the world. A bite requires urgent urgent attention.

Young Menza with Royjan after surving in his Black Mamba bite. Copyright picture: Rojjan Taylor
A young Orma girl who was treated successfully with good Antivenom from a Red Spitting Cobra bite. Picture copyright Royjan Taylor
The young man who recently died in Voi from bad Antivenom.

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Amboseli’s Swamps

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Part 2 of 2

Published Nation 26 Nov 2016

 

Kilimanjaro is resplendent in the blazing morning sun – but its snow cap’s on the peak of Kibo has melted to a thin teardrop. The Maasai bring their cattle into the park under the watch of the Kenya Wildlife Service rangers. As the skeletal cattle head for the swamps, they raise a halo of dust on the dry plains of Amboseli – derived from Empusel, the Maasai word for dry dusty plains. “There’s no water outside for the cattle,” explains the KWS ranger. “So we allow the community to bring the cattle for a few hours to drink in the swamps.”

flamingos-in-amboseli-by-noomotio-hill-copyright-rupi-mangat-nov-26-2016-800x600

Away from the edge of the park, we’re up on Observation Hill or Noomotio that’s juxtaposed between the lush swamp and the dry-white dust plains under the watchful gaze of Kilimanjaro. It’s surreal for in the midst of the drought-parched land, the deep blue lake has an islet brimming with the beautiful pink bird – the lesser flamingos and flocks of white pelicans.

It’s an exciting game drive in the custom-designed safari cruiser from Ol Tukai Lodge. By the edge of a swamp an enormous Verreaux’s eagle owl with its pink-eyelids so visible through the binoculars is perched on its yellow-bark acacia tree. It is Africa’s largest owl and the only owl with pink eyelids – we’re suitably impressed.

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