By Justin Marozzi (2006)
 …'By
now we are experiencing a youthful clamour for more game from
Clem. She wants to see elephants, lions, cheetahs, giraffes, you
name it, and this, after all, is the reason we are here. I want
to witness a kill for the first time.
Maximising our carbon footprint we fly to the Mara for a perfect
finale in the Kicheche Bush Camp. A quick exchange with
my wife…."I"m not staying in another tent" "I'm sure it's
incredibly luxurious like a hotel room, probably." .. It is.
We are lucky to have Joseph, a Maasai in his late 20"s, as our
guide. Like Stanley and Ngasakwe before him, he can spot anything
that moves in the unfathomable distance. He offers us a smorgasbord
of game over several days ; waterbuck, hippopotamus, cheetah,
lion, elephant, giraffe, snort-farting hyena, thousands of wildebeest,
in headstrong, headlong stampede, Thompson gazelle, Grants gazelle,
mongoose, jackal, crested crane, secretary bird, eagle, vulture
…. the procession of wild animals blurs into excess.
.....The temperature drops. Clouds bed down and the light grows
creamy, dampening the horizons into mist distance. Wind whips
across the plains. The wavy grasses are the colour of ripening
wheat. With his unerring instinct for action, Joseph takes us
over to a spot from where we witness a dramatic showdown between
a lame wildebeest struggling to keep up with the herd and a prowling
lioness smells brunch. Surely the wildebeest is toast? It turns
to face it's potential nemesis. Life and death in front of us.
Feints and counter feints. But the lion has no support and eventually
she gives up. So close. |
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