Africa: Maji Moto - Masai Mara National Reserve

We woke up feeling caught up on sleep, had a great breakfast at the hotel and checked out of our rooms. At the entrance we met Joe (our guide for our week in Kenya) and loaded our bags in the Safari Land Rover. It had six seats which was perfect for our family and had lots of leg room. We drove four hours out of Nairobi through the grasslands and farmlands with a few villages.  It was interesting to see how people lived and worked. We saw huts with tin roofs, goats and cows everywhere and people walking with big yellow jugs getting water somewhere. Outside the city there weren't typical neighbourhoods and houses like we are used to but most similar to what we had seen in Costa Rica and Peru. We made one stop at the edge of a large cliff side to stretch our legs and see the view.

We drove the rest of the way to Maji Moto which is Swahilian for hot water, referring to the natural hot springs near the camp.

Once we arrived we got a tour of the eco camp. The tents were nice with a thatched roof over the top of the tent to stop the rain. Inside the tent there were two mattresses on the floor and a solar light attached to the top of the tent.

We had three tents to fit all of us so Zaddek and I had one, Kaden and Dad, and obviously Mom and Sage. The landscape was dry and rough and we had a nice view over the plains.

 

There were no bathrooms in the tents so you had to walk to an outhouse bathroom and an outdoor shower that they filled up with hot spring water every morning.

We put our bags in our tents and had some lunch at the main lodge. We had pasta and fresh fruit before starting our tour of the land.

Sam was our Masai guide who showed us all of the plants the Masai use like a cotton like plant they roll into a ball and put fire into the centre. They can walk a few miles and the ball won't light on fire and the fire would stay lit. This way they could transport fire instead of starting a new one every time. They call it a fire wallet. We also got to see a plant with such a strong scent it masked theirs for hunting. We kept walking and saw some of the huge cactus trees we had seen on the drive earlier.

After learning about all the plants we kept on going to see the hot springs. There were a lot of people at the hot springs collecting water in big containers. The hot springs boils the water and cleans it from bacteria making it a clean free source of water for the Masai community. The village was quite a distance away so some people had donkeys or wheelbarrows to help carry the large water tubs. A lot had to carry the water for miles just to get clean water to drink. Some people were bathing a little further down while others were cleaning clothes.

We left the hot springs and walked back to the eco camp before dark. Along the way we saw some of the herds and their shepherds heading to the water hole. A lot of them were kids our age or even younger. After a quick break we got to see how Masai warriors practice their aim with a game almost like dodgeball but with cactus stems.

We even got to try against each other but it was more difficult than it looked. Then we got to see some of the cultural dances of the Masai and joined in their warrior jumping.

Once it got dark we had a great dinner and they showed us how to start a fire and use the cotton like plant or fire wallet.

After dinner and the fire demonstration we headed back to the tents for the night. They had someone out on watch all night near our tents so we weren't worried about animals and it was nice to go to sleep with the sounds of nature, especially the goats right outside our tent in the early morning.