On The Road Again

One surprising thing about this part of Africa is the altitude. So far, I haven't been below about 5500 ft. That's the elevation of Nairobi. When you leave Nairobi, the first thing you do is climb over the Escarpment and descend into the Great Rift Valley. At the top of the Escarpment, you are about 9000 ft up. The floor of the Great Rift Valley is about 7500 ft. That means that if you exert, you notice the altitude. No wonder the Kenyans are great distance runners. Training at 7500 ft or higher would really pack the red cells. The other thing you notice is that it can get quite cool at night. Daytime temperatures are pleasantly warm, but not hot. At night it can get quite cool. I was expecting this in the Namib desert later in my trip, but not here. In the next part of the trip, we will shed some altitude because Lake Victoria is around 3500 ft.

Nakuru National Park, Kenya

Our first stop on the trip to Rwanda was Kenya's Nakuru National Park. The park lies in the northern end of the Great Rift Valley. It is a rather compact park, you can easily drive around the perimeter in a day. The center of the park is covered by a large lake. We saw Zebras, Antelope, Baboons, several Giraffe including a couple babies, about a dozen White Rhinos and a pair of really close Lions (50mm close). Not a bad start for the trip!

Trip Route

Here's a little animation of my trip route. I won't be in any one place longer than a week or so between now and mid October.