Hell's Gate

This weekend Aubree and I took off for Lake Naivasha (one guidebook called it the "St Tropez" of Africa-now I have never been to St Tropez but i reckon that statement may have been a bit of an exaggeration as elton john was nowhere to be seen). Lake Naivasha has many hippos living in it, one of which recently decided to have an australian camper for breakfast. We did not camp. Spent the night in an ok establishment and woke early to go for a hike in Hell's Gate. Our plans for the day had been changing all night since we were supposed to stay through monday but had been informed that we had to be back by early mondya morning to go to a masaii age ceremony (more on that later). So off we went getting dropped at the road to the gate and beginning our hike. Hell's Gate is breathtaking-you are surrounded by red cliff walls and vast plains with leaping animals. It is the only game park that you can walk through, despite the presence of buffalo, who as we have discussed, like to pee on people and kill them. The other thing that supposedly makes it safe is the absence of lions, which also are known to attack people and eat them. At the entrance we asked for directions to the ranger post where we would turn off to the lower canyons. They provided directions with the provision that we absolutely not deviate from the specified trail onto any of th eother trails. So we walked in about 7k or so seeing lots of zebra and antelopes of a sorts. I spotted something in a tree which proved to be a half of a dead baby zebra. We debated just which animals like to take their snacks into trees and decided that it must be a cheetah since the books swore no leopards or lions. A bit up the road we saw a large zebra carcas lying in the brush. Aubree started to investigate whether the zebra had died of more natural causes or was made into a meal but I hesitated since large signs all over the park tell you-DO NOT LEAVE THE TRAIL; DO NOT GO INTO THE BUSH FOR YOUR OWN SAFETY, WE ARE NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR YOUR PERSON IF ANYTHING HAPPENS TO YOU IN THR PARK. Basically, it seemed like a bad idea, but it was quite curious since the only thing that would kill an adult zebra and leave it in that fashion is a lion. Hmmmm.
Arriving at the ranger's station we got directions for a short hike into the canyon. We also saw a sign from 2002 saying that hikers and bikers were to stay off of certain trails since a pride of lions had been spotted. Hmmm again....Heading down we were clearly confused (the trail is not obvious at all here and we didnt have a map) and were corrected several times by a courteous british chap. After a couple more blunders for whatever the reason he decided to wait for us. This was quite fortuntae as he know the canyon well and was able to show us things we probably would not have otherwise seen. The hike was quite fun-a lot of scrambling requied at parts, some tromping through the water, leaping across the slowly disappearing river, and ducking through the brush. Hell's Gate houses the largest geothermal plant in the world. The plant is expected to be able to provide enough energy to supply all of kenya's needs someday. There are natural steam vents that turn up at parts in the canyon so we hiked out to the largest, had a snack and chatted. It turns out our new friend was a journalist/documentarist, with two sons both following in his footsteps. He traveled all over the world, and had recently returned from a stint in Iraq. Far more interesting to me, he had spent a great deal of time in Congo. When i think of africa i think of Congo-the insanity, the beauty, and the primal existance. He was happy to share some stories and tell us about it and a myriad of other things that we asked about. It was also nice to get the opinion of someone who lived outside of the kenya that we had been experienceing. I asked about the Masai and whether modernization had left them behind or was hurting them since they have clung so fervently to their culture. He felt that compared to other tribes in some ways the Masai are somewhat better off since they have cattle, a strong community infrastructure, and have been able to maintain their cultural identity so strongly. Many of the other tribes that eagerly embraced modernization have completely lost themselves and live in abject poverty in the urban slums. However, the Masai are also less likely to be educated as they are nomadic following the rains and green grass, meaning to get jobs in the "modern" world they cannot compete, and are under duress because of their practies of selling the young girls and mutilating them. We also asked about whether or not there are any lions in hell's gate, and told about the sign we had seen. Our friend bristled a bit since the presence of lions should mean the end of walking in the park, and though he maintained a calm demeanor I noticed he started carrying a stick for the rest of our hike.