I know it's been a while since I last posted, but that's because my grandmother and her sister have been here since the 13th and we've been busy fitting everything in. Our days have been crowded, but good.
These past couple days we've been out of town taking a vacation with them. We stayed at a house about three to four hours north of Nairobi, right next to the Ol Pejeta Conservancy, a private conservancy that's actually not a national park.
We visited the Mount Kenya Wildlife Conservancy Animal Orphanage (long name, right?!) on Friday, where many rescued animals live that either cannot go back into the wild or are in rehabilitation until they're able to return to the wild. They also have a breeding program for the mountain bongo, and endangered species of antelope found only in the Mount Kenya area.
Some of the animals are allowed to roam free around a large open space while others, such as the big cats, the buffalo, and the monkeys are not. The mountain bongo pictured below is very tame and was allowed to walk around, so we were able to pet her. There were also some llamas that we could feed. Llamas are not indigenous to Kenya, but these llamas have been used for pack animals on Mount Kenya.
All the pictures below are from the animal orphanage.
Photo #1- The mane of a mountain bongo
Photo #2- One of my brothers petting the bongo- another hand picture!
Photo #3- A mountain bongo
Photo #4- A abandoned baby bushbuck that was rescued by the orphanage. She was so cute!!
Photo #5- Speedy Gonzales, a giant 150 year old tortoise rescue
Photo #6- Another hand picture of the guide with Speedy
Photo #7- A male cheetah lazing around
Photo #8- A cheetah portrait
Photo #9- A cheetah yawn!
Photo #10- A baby zebra that was found abandonded and brought to the orphanage. He hasn't gotten used to people yet and is still very lonely.
Photo #11- Close up of a male ostrich
Photo #12- A llama that was perturbed that I was disturbing his drink
Photo #13- An Egyptian goose (same as the title picture) in the middle of a bath
Photo #14- A rock hyrax or dassie, the creature that was in our attic for so long
