Hip Hip Hooray

Zebra at the Impala Park, Kisumu

This is genuinely for the 5th April!  At least I hope so - you never know what’s going to happen before you actually “publish”.

Cindy and I spent the morning at the house, catching up with some cleaning and washing - and yesterday’s blog!

This afternoon we went to Kisumu, where I bought some souvenirs, and then down past Kiboko (Hippo) Bay, to  where the Dunga Wetland area is now recognised as being valuable for the number of plant, animal and particularly bird species.  A centre has been built which welcomes both locals and tourists  and does outreach conservation work.  The people who work there are locals and many of them are also  fishermen, one of whom took Cindy and I in his boat to seek out hippopotami. The guide who came with us was well-versed in the bird species we saw.  Fishing has declined in the area overall partly because of over-fishing and partly because of the invasion of water hyacinths.  

Hippo in Lake Victoria

We arrived at the bay just in time to hire the boat but were, unfortunately (for me), too late to see round the conservation centre - a “must” for next time. 

We were lucky enough to see at least four hippos (two male and two female) while out in the boat and, although the boat was rocking quite a lot in the waves, I managed one half decent photo.  It’s a little blurred, but probably worth showing just to prove my story! Hip Hip ...

Chris, "our" fisherman

The hippo photo adds to impala and zebra seen yesterday at the Impala Park.  Other animals were also in evidence (leopard, cheetahs, lions, ostriches, monkeys, baboons) but the great majority were in captivity so I wasn’t too keen to photograph them in such circumstances.  It was said that they were all endangered species or injured in some way and therefore the “wild” was not the best place for them but it is still sad to see them there.