Home in Kenya!

Jambo from Kenya!!

Sorry it took so long for my first post but we are now all settled in at home in Kenya and ready to go! It’s great to be back in Kenya for my second time and I already find myself very comfortable and in the full swing of things. This trip is much different than the last because the work I am doing here is now part of my PhD whereas my first trip in 2007 was part of an international internship. Three more things that are different are: the people I am working with, I have a new camera, we now have a project car! This time I am working with a new graduate student in my lab who worked with me all summer sampling lakes in the Algoma Highlands of Central Ontario – his name is Jace. We had a very productive and successful summer together and I am looking forward to the work we will be doing here – sampling lakes, looking at the algae community, and testing for toxic species such as cyanobacteria that may be harmful to the lake, animals, and humans.

We landed in Nairobi on Wednesday September 29^th at night and were immediately greeted by Melissa, Rachel (and Rachel’s sister Patty), other graduate students in my lab, and our driver who took us to one of my favourite restaurants in the world – The Carnivore! This is an all you can eat meat frenzy where you are served all kinds of exotic meats such as ostrich, crocodile, ox, and many others. We were extremely tired from 18 hours of travel but nothing could stop us from a dinner at The Carnivore. After dinner and a few Tuskers (local beer), we headed to the hotel for a solid night of comatose sleep. The next day (Thursday) we did a bit of touring, shopping, and eating around Nairobi. Unfortunately Rachel and her sister had to leave us that night to head back to Canada and we continued our journey on to Naivasha where we now have rented a house for our project here in Kenya. The house is absolutely gorgeous and very close to our study lake – Lake Naivasha. I will post pictures of the house soon.

Today Jace and I caught up on much of our sleep – 13 hours worth! As soon as we woke up, we went for a long walk around the property down to the lake. On the walk we saw all kinds of animals (giraffe, zebra, wildebeest, impala, and water buck). The house is very near the place where I camped in Naivasha last time I was here so I was very familiar with the area and the animals we saw - I have posted some pictures below! It ended up being quite an eventful walk because on the way back, I had my back to the lake and was taking pictures of Jace and Melissa walking ahead of me. Jace yelled out and pointed behind me at a pair of wildebeest who decided to start charging at us and they were not too far away. Not knowing the protocol for a wildebeest attack, we starting running through the bush hoping to lose them. They eventually stopped running when we were out of sight behind the brush but they did stick around for a while scoping us out as we climbed the hill in the distance. We made it back to the house, looked back at some of the pictures and talked about what could have been headline news in a Naivasha paper if the wildebeest were even a little more determined. We went for a fantastic dinner, came back to the house, and planned out the next few days.

We are going to be very busy lake sampling and setting up experiments in nearby lakes. We have many collaborators and friends in the area and I look forward to working with everyone over the next two months. We brought all kinds of lab gear and I am very well equipped with new field clothes care of mine and Dusa’s parents! I will take many pictures with the new camera and post on this site as often as possible. We have a mailing address here so if you are interested, email me and I’ll let you know what it is. Also, if you would like anything from Kenya (post cards, etc.) email me your address and I will send you something! That’s where we stand and I will leave you with a few pictures and pieces of information I forgot about Kenya but was quickly reminded when I returned:

1)      Kenyans are the friendliest most welcoming people, full of culture and always happy

2)      Kenya is absolutely gorgeous and is the second best country on Earth – my favourite place to be outside of Canada and happy to call home for the next few months

Jace, Melissa, and friend

Stampede Jumper

Jace and the boys

Smiling for the camera

Baby and ma

Three giraffes and one Ryan

Grazing giraffe

Jace and giraffe

Me, Melissa, and zebra

Hide and seek giraffe

Just tall enough

Wildebeest who ran us out of town

Asante Sana, Squashed Banana

Ry