Go wild for Kenya safari
Violence followed Kenya's election but now they hope a political compromise will revive the vitally important tourist industry.
In Kenya of late big game has been better protected than people. Enlightened policies tend to put beast before man.
The consequences of shooting a lion for sport would be headlines and years in jail. Violently killing another human being might make a paragraph in the Daily Nation newspaper.
The image of Africa as a cursed, self-destructive madhouse was sharpened when Kenya's rival tribes and political parties turned on one another in the aftermath of the election last December.
The Rift Valley, an incredible geographical fault-line, is also fractured by power shifts and ethnic divisions. It suffered some of the worst atrocities when this hitherto relatively stable country saw disputed votes translated into a bloodbath. The slaughter left
more than 1,500 dead and drove 250,000 from their homes.
The economy has been another casualty and tourism in particular. It was Kenya's top foreign revenue earner, worth about 500m last year and provided employment, directly or indirectly, for three million.
Within days of the post-election mayhem, many had lost their livelihoods. In the first three months of this year, the tourist industry's revenue fell by almost 73 per cent. Beach resorts emptied,
and wildlife roaming the national parks lost its audience.
So Kenya has embarked on a public relations fightback, making the point that the violence happened well away from the sights and sounds that lure visitors. It was probably no coincidence that President Kibaki and his thwarted election challenger, Raila Odinga, now the Prime Minister, named their power-sharing cabinet for peace shortly before the 204 journalists who had been invited here headed back home to Europe, China, Japan, and North America.
Slipping some positive political news into our luggage, alongside thrilling impressions of the natural world, was understandable. The new government needs all the help it can get. While the journos were here, the Kenyan Martin Lel won the London Marathon for the third time in four years. Lel's triumph, and those of the nation's other great athletes, are a reminder of the good stories in this land of contradictions, stories which transcend tribal conflict, corruption, poverty and Aids.
So far as animal welfare goes, Kenya shames many developed countries. Since 1977 hunting of all kinds has been banned. It was a pioneer in recognising – if only for pragmatic financial reasons initially – that many more people are keen to look at and appreciate animals in the wild, than want to destroy them.
Today's visitors to Kenya relate more to David Attenborough than to Ernest Hemingway. A photograph of "Papa" Hemingway, a shot cheetah at his feet, at a lodge in the Amboseli National Park beneath the snows of Kilimanjaro, seems almost a reproach now.
A couple of generations ago Hemingway was typical of the hunter-tourists – and the white settlers and indigenous tribes – who plundered the big game. Today, despite the poachers who evade security measures, many species, including the Big Five – leopard, lion, elephant, buffalo and rhinoceros – are flourishing after being on the brink of extinction.
In some areas the no-hunting policy has even created problems of over-population and led to animals being moved to less crowded parts of the bush.
Much of the success is due to the Kenya Wildlife Service, KWS. Some might say its investment seems over-generous when so many people are in chronic need. The response to that is it supports a culture which in turn has been earning millions through tourism, at least some of which helps to alleviate human catastrophes.
The KWS is also re-shaping Kenyan society. I met Jillo Katelo, a research assistant with the service whose family are nomadic pastoralists in the north of the country. Their community survives by trading goats and camels and there was a time when Jillo's father hunted elephants and lions – not for self-preservation, but as a symbol of heroism and status.
He made the mistake of sending this son to school and through Jillo's education he has since learned the value of conservation. Father is now curbing the instincts of centuries. Jillo told this story as our dhow skirted a reef in the Kisite Marine National Park in the Indian Ocean. He's there to study dolphins, sharks, and humpback whales – after being transferred from a rhino reserve.
Working alongside the wildlife service are private conservationists, several of British descent. In the early 1920s, Lewa Downs, in the foothills of Mount Kenya, became a cattle ranch run by the Craig family with roots in Cumbria. Apart from enduring features of life such as cricket bats, gin and tonics at sundown and biplanes darting between earthen airstrips, this vast estate has changed dramatically since the colonial era.
Lewa is now a 100-square mile non-profit wildlife conservancy whose work extends way beyond the protection of endangered species such as Grevy's zebra. As Will Craig puts it, his grandmother shot rhino there and today around 1m a year is being spent on conserving them after poaching for horn decimated their number.
Safaris here don't come cheap – prices start at about 600-a-head, which includes return flights from Nairobi, two nights full board in luxury lodges, game drives and conservancy fees – but visitors have the satisfaction of knowing they are also contributing to Lewa's support for healthcare and education in surrounding villages, Aids relief, orphanages, and other community projects.
The Craigs' neighbours include the descendants of a Welshman, Will Powys. When the First World War ended, he managed ranches after distinguished service in the East African Mounted Rifles. He was paid in sheep and then applied for his own land when the British government offered plots to war veterans to encourage farming in the beautiful and largely uninhabited Kenyan highlands.
In time his flocks' Merino wool was fetching top prices at auctions in Bradford and London and he was able to buy more land, including Borana. This is a 35,000-acre ranch more than 6,000 feet above sea level, but with an equable climate despite being only 17 miles north of the Equator. The cattle-rearing helps to support a tannery and leather workshop employing the blind and disabled and the owners are striking a delicate balance between commerce and ecology. They have increased the emphasis on the interests of wildlife, and the tourism it brings.
It is centred on Borana Lodge, a small complex of cottages on a rocky hillside where home comforts – en-suite bathrooms, large beds, open fires, fine wines and a swimming pool – come as close as safety permits to the wild frontier.
From the verandah you can observe the subtle shifts within animal and bird life as day becomes night and a sky so starry that the Milky Way resembles a great silvery highway. For a European townie, being this close to the timeless rituals of nature can be disconcerting. In darkness, beside a small dam, an unseen lion loped around the rim. The chill air was filled with startling sounds, a shrieking call here, a savage grunt there.
Even among the soft furnishings of a cosy, lamp-lit chalet, creatures were on the move. Field mice enjoy the taste of scented soap, apparently, and I was alarmed by the bulky shape beneath the bedclothes. I jabbed at it, then leapt back. Nothing stirred, so I jabbed again. I worked up the courage to investigate. It was a hot water bottle. For a moment it was if we'd swapped the Equator for a wintry evening in the Dales.
Borana also offers horse riding, mountain bikes and safaris by vehicle or on foot. From the surrounding ridges the views are sensational. Between you and distant mountain ranges are the plains which are home to elephant, antelope, buffalo, baboon, Patas monkey, Jackson's hartebeest, and the big cats.
On a bookshelf back at base there was a copy of Born Free, the bestseller about Elsa, the orphaned lion cub raised by Joy Adamson and her game warden husband, George, which became an Oscar-winning film. Nearly half a century on, the tale still draws fans through dusty little towns and along ochre-coloured tracks in the Meru National Park, 75 miles from Borana, to what must be among the most bizarre shrines in the world.
Deep in the bush, under a canopy of riverine acacia and doum palms, is the stone-covered grave of Elsa, "January 1956 – January 1961". Mawkish, or fitting tribute to a remarkable relationship between the animal kingdom and an inspirational couple?
The emotions of farmers who see their livestock butchered by protected game are at odds with those of indulged foreign visitors reared on TV wildlife programmes. In every respect the enduring Elsa saga is far from the country's political upheavals. Many Kenyans believe they have the wrong man as president after what was a messy fudge to the post-election crisis. Some find pride in a presidential candidate on another continent.
Barack Obama has Kenyan blood and his father began life herding goats. From primitive rural communities, to the chaotic sprawl of Nairobi and steamy Mombasa, people are saying that Obama in the White House would somehow give them a greater say in the future.
In their eyes he'd be elevated to president of the world.
Getting there:
Scheduled flights to Kenya have resumed and some tour operators are offering discounts.
Africa Sky offers five nights on safari on a full board basis and four nights on the beach on a half board basis, with a night in Nairobi from 1,546 per person. Price includes return flights on Virgin Atlantic, all internal flights and transfers and accommodation for departures in June 2008. Based on two sharing and subject to availability. 0870 9040 925 www.africasky.co.uk
Virgin Atlantic flies to Nairobi daily from Heathrow. Sale fares start from 507.70 including all taxes, for travel up to June 30. 08705 747747 or www.virginatlantic.com
The Travel Collection has a Big Five Safari deal, nine days from 1,295, with the option of adding a week-long beach holiday. 01306 871131 www.travelcollection.co.uk
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Saturday 11 February 2012
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