Lake Nakuru National Park, Kenya - May 2014

Lake Nakuru NP is in the Rift Valley 100 miles northwest of Nairobi. It is at an elevation of 5,755 feet and covers 73 square miles, including the lake (which is 17.4 square miles) and land around the lake. An additional 116 square miles around the lake is fenced off to protect the rhinos (both black and white) in the park from poaching. We arrived late afternoon after a long drive from Shaba NR and went out for a short late afternoon game drive. The next morning we had to continue on to our next destination.

We saw at least 11 species of mammal, including our first lions. We also saw our first rhinos, a number of white rhinos, and our first defassa waterbucks, as well as common or ellipsen waterbucks that we'd seen previously. We saw lots of common impala and Cape buffalo, getting quite close to some grizzled old Cape buffalo for some great photos. We saw our first and only Rothschild giraffes, 3, at some distance. We saw several eland at a great distance and quite a few Thomsen's gazelles. Grant's zebra were prevalent and we drove through a troop of olive baboons as they were settling into trees along the road for the night.

We also saw at least 7 species of bird. We saw both yellow-billed and red-billed oxpeckers, pretty prevalent on the rhinos, but also the waterbuck and Cape buffalo. Cattle egrets also flocked around the rhinos, snatching the insects stirred up by their massive bodies. We saw greater and lesser flamingos on Lake Nakuru in large flocks, but so far out that it was difficult to isolate individual birds - it was mostly just masses of pink with a mixture of both birds indistinguishable without long lenses, and later, cropped photos. The flamingos were one of the big attractions for Lake Nakuru. We saw our first Guineafowl, Reichenow's helmeted Guineafowl, which became a favorite of mine. I also noted a Marabou stork in a photo near some Cape buffalo and there were lots of other birds near the lake that we frankly didn't pay attention to because we had limited time and were focused on the rhinos, Cape buffalo and flamingos.

I would love to go back to Lake Nakuru and spend more time. Our time there was too limited. It was used primarily as a way station between Shaba NR and Masai Mara NR, our next destination.

Publicado el octubre 7, 2021 12:34 TARDE por rwcannon57