Slow Dance of The Elephants

The Aberdare Experience

Aberdare Ark is a modern-day machaan, except that it is a building (shaped in an ark) with all amenities afforded to tourists for a comfortable stay! It sits next to a natural salt lick in a clearing within the lush Aberdare tropical forests of Kenya. The Ark has a viewing gallery in the basement where one is level with the waterhole, a terrace which gives one an overhead view and a mezzanine lookout which is barely clear of the tallest elephant’s height!

When we reached the Ark it was approaching sunset, a perfect time for animals to congregate at the waterhole before they called it a day. An elephant parade was lined up, with some African cape buffaloes blending in, almost as though to welcome us. In the awed hush all we could hear was the odd rumble and rustle, an overwhelming assertion of life! Unlike other safaris where we encountered elephant herds browsing and feeding from time to time and took pretty pictures, the Aberdare experience was one to watch elephant behaviour and bonding, intimately, in their natural habitat.

From the terrace, I spotted a cow with a calf huddled by its side; other young ones came to caress and pet it, all the time ensuring that it was well-flanked and protected. Two juveniles from different clans came upon each other, touched and twined their trunks, and indulged in boisterous play for a while. One of the young adults had something hanging loose at the end of its trunk; it took me a while to figure that the trunk itself was mutilated and a part of it was hanging by a lip! It seemed like an old wound and the mammal was able to adapt it beautifully despite the deformity.

Elephant herds of varying strength were trooping in and out of the thicket to the waterhole. One of the young male was wounded with blood oozing from its face. You could see, it was desperately seeking attention and commiseration from others, like a little child. It would go close and try to touch every other elephant that came out of the bush. I was shocked to see that it was being shunned by one and all! To my mind it seemed like a case of adults chiding, “I told you so”, for “not listening” to sane counsel! Or maybe there was some other explanation that we have no way of knowing.

As the day wound to a close, I shifted my observation post to the open balcony by the path where the animals had to retreat into the thick vegetation. There was an embankment of boulders - two feet wide - below the balcony to keep the elephants from straying too close. Every time an elephant approached my side and passed by, it would, unfailingly, lift up its trunk sniffing my presence. But their reactions were different. Some were wary, some baulked and some actually bolted, timidly, tail in the air. I wondered how much of my olfactory signature was imprinted on their memories and if I were to encounter them out in the wild would they recognise me!

The jumbos had called it a day and all the resident tourists too retreated to their cubby-hole cabins for a doze. Being claustrophobic, I had to wait out the night somehow. Somewhere around 2 or 3 at night, I must have drowsed only to be awakened by a sixth sense. I went to the balcony to gulp in fresh air just in time to see a faint trickle of pearly grey masses coming out into the open. In the still moonlit night, for the next hour and a half, a slow dance-drama unfolded - for my eyes only - leaving me completely dazed.

A matriarch with a calf, few females and some sub-adults began confabulating by the pool. Soon the calf lay at its mother’s feet to rest and three-four grown-ups stood in a semi-circle forming a protective cover. 

The mater moved away closer to the water’s edge, sniffed the wind, and kneeled down as though checking the depth of the pool with its probing trunk. It tore away the grass growing at the edges and gobbled it. Soon it had rolled onto its side, raised its trunk, and was contorting its body! My first impression was that this animal was sick; that it might have a tummy problem. For an instant it almost seemed like it was in throes. I hadn’t seen anything so bizarre all my life! The matriarch wallowed and writhed as the herd watched respectfully from a distance, not breaking her trance.

She then strode back to its family by when the calf was up and rejuvenated. Then a slow, deliberate, rhythmic ritual ensued… trunks entangling, twining, and feeling each other. The entire herd stood still in a wedge formation with its trunks touching. After a long while, the formation turned inside out with the bottoms now jostled together. Was it a family get-together where they were narrating stories and anecdotes, trading notes and even, joking?

The calf and the sub-adult were left out of the loop, surprisingly, left unprotected behind their backs! When the calf attempted to pry from behind, curious, the matriarch without so much as a look gave it the boot sending it scurrying out of the charmed circle! With no perceived threats and comfortable in the privacy of their circle, they could now afford to keep the pesky young ones out of their adult “bedroom” conversation!

The herd stood in varied patterns and formations (interminably, it seemed!) and changed positions at intervals. If that one hour could be filmed, fast forwarded and reduced to a 15- 20-minute clip, then I would be witness to a rhythmic gyration, a slow ballet.

Was it a spiritual ceremony or a cult ritual? Or I wondered if the herd was mourning having heard and read so much about elephant’s graveyards and death rituals.

Benson, the in-house naturalist, discounted it saying that in the 40 years of the lodge’s existence no elephant had died or was buried there. He had this to say: “Elephants are highly evolved social creatures and with a lot of research being done on their memory and behaviour, scientists haven’t finished yet. I would think we haven’t begun yet.” 

Also read My Elephant Memories

ALL PHOTOGRAPHS IN THIS BLOG/ BLOGSPOT ARE THE AUTHOR'S ORIGINAL WORK/ COPYRIGHT

MY ELEPHANT MEMORIES

The news item of the barbaric slaughter of Satao - a rare bull with nearly 50 kg of tusk (each) grazing the ground – by poachers caught my eye and made my heart bleed. Visions of African Elephants - tuskers and matriarchs, calves and juveniles – that I had seen in the diverse ecological habitats of Kenya - from the plains to the forests - swam in front of my eyes. Satao was a Tsavo bull and it was here in the vast historic savannas of Tsavo that I had my initial tryst with the species Loxodonta Africana.

RED ELEPHANTS OF TSAVO

En route from Mombasa to Nairobi early in our Kenya sojourn, we decided to take a detour into Tsavo territory. Tsavo National Park is Kenya’s largest, divided into East and West, East being the wilder and less frequented of the two.

In the lazy noon hour, the park seemed devoid of animals though the bush was buzzing with birds. We had almost given up hope after a few hours when the elephant parade began! Being intimately acquainted with the Indian elephant, which is grey-black, the first sight of (brick) ‘red’ elephants was truly exceptional. It is Tsavo’s rich volcanic soil, ochre in colour, which gives elephants that distinctive hue when they wallow or bathe in mud.

In the blazing equatorial sun, we came upon a “nuclear” family trying to shield them under/near a sparse shrub, barely managing to tuck their heads in! That classic sight was a testimony to the species’ qualities of tolerance and accommodation of others.  

Much later, when we visited Tsavo West, the trails we followed threw up elephant hooves, intermittently, but not their owners. Bare boles of acacias stripped of leaves and twigs stood as signs of elephant ravages, but the perpetrators of carnage were nowhere in sight. That is how it is in Tsavo country, the excitement lies more in the suggestion than in the spotting.

After hours of following the red dirt tracks through the acacia-commiphora woodlands all we could see was a herd of elephants walking into the horizon. Should a small herd of elephants walking away into distance - a pastiche at once of mundanity and mystery - be any less thrilling than an elephant at close quarters posing for a photograph? For me, this is a more intimate portrait, almost as if the elephants were leading me into their private domain, if only I exerted my imagination and followed them there.

***************************

ELLIES OF AMBOSELI!

It was March of 2009; the year of drought in Amboseli. Nyika or African bush is largely treeless and hence can be punishing in its natural elements at the best of times. In such a parched landscape, the scene that stayed with me was this: a long-shot of lumbering herd of elephants with young ones in tow cutting through the simmering heat of the dustbowl in search of water. 

This family would have to walk for miles to get to the receding water sources and it would have to do it as fast or slow as the pace of the youngest calf. We, who simply reach out for bottled water or a can of coke in the middle of nowhere, to wet our lips or soothe our parched throats, cannot even begin to imagine the herd’s predicament. The poignancy of the scene lay in the realization of that harsh reality of life in the wild.

As the herd approached our vehicle the calf buckled under sheer exhaustion and lay down to rest: the clan simply stayed put in some sort of protective formation. They stood freeze frame for what seemed like an eternity and we waited with bated breath to see what would happen next. As my son interpreted the scenario, the calf that was resting was the unlikely king, and the family of adults, the servile subjects who had to wait it out. I felt as though the earth had stopped spinning and that instant was IT… for the elephants there was no past, no future; the essence of existence was the present moment – poised between life and death.

The elephant herd would pause for as long as it would take the calf to regain its energy before resuming their long march. We, however, had to move on so as not to overstay safari propreity and had no way of knowing the fate of the calf or of the clan. But, possibly, the entire family would have had to go without water longer than their tolerance threshold, or perhaps I was underestimating their patience and endurance.

DIONYSIUS 

The sight of an imposing lone tusker is worth more than a pride of lions (so to speak!) and we were lucky to see one at a distance near the Olokenya swamp. (Later through the film “Elephants Memories” by Dr. Cynthia Moss we got to know that this was the legendary Dionysius). 

The mammoth, his tusks tending to ground, emerged out of a thicket like a chimera. Surprised or simply gauging our mood as we were trying to sense his, he stood there looking directly at us. Even from that distance we could feel his brute presence, a colossus striding the earth like royalty. Suddenly, contrary to its nature, it darted into nearby bushes and simply vanished before our eyes. It was as though the mask had been ripped off his face and the blinkers off mine as I realized how vulnerable that lone ranger was. No companion, no family, no herd – a persona non grata eking it out in an unfriendly world.

*****************************

CLOSE ENCOUNTER AT MANYARA

Even as we had started on our game drive in Lake Manyara National Park in Tanzania, two young frisky elephants feeding by the roadside blocked our path. I was consternated at the sight of one of them fanning its ears menacingly and for once the cocoon of our vehicle seemed vulnerable. What a contrast, I couldn’t help comparing, with Ian Douglas Hamilton’s (Lake Manyara was this elephant-expert’s playing field) bravado in undertaking the hazardous task of photographing elephants with ears spread out, for identification, at times crouching on trees or even on foot!

Not wanting to antagonise them, the driver backed off. Finally, they slipped into the thicket clearing our way. Back at our resort, the hotel staff was emphatic that no game strayed in there as the lodge was outside the National Park, though we had seen some bushbuck stroll below our balcony.

By dusk, after the game drive, elephant blockade fresh in mind, we sauntered into the lodge chatting away walking up to the room. Fellow lodgers - a couple – waved a hello or so we thought; instead they greeted us, saying: “Look there, by the (swimming) pool… Elephants”!

My heart stopped beating as I saw two grey apparitions appear over the curve of the hill. They walked towards the same direction as us, parallel to us, the lodge rooms dividing our paths. Our friends turned to their room leaving us alone to decide our fate. Silently, we kept walking, praying, and managed to reach our rooms safely.  The wind Gods had aided us. 

From the first floor balcony, just in time, we caught a herd of three, including a calf, within whispering distance! I shudder to think, what would have happened if our family of three (me, my husband and son) had come face to face with the elephant trio.

*****************************

It was much later in Kenya’s Aberdare forests that I was lured into the secret universe of the elephants where I was witness to their legendary bonding.  

Read Slow Dance of the Elephants


ALL PHOTOGRAPHS IN THIS BLOG/ BLOGSPOT ARE THE AUTHOR'S ORIGINAL WORK/ COPYRIGHT

Samburu Safari Salama

Every safari is unique; whether you  go to the same sanctuary at different seasons or whether two different people go on a safari to the same park on the same day, the experiences rarely coincide, and in fact, may be poles apart. I have travelled to most major game parks in Kenya, especially the Maasai territories, but the county of the Samburu tribe had eluded me thus far. Samburu National Reserve in North Kenya is an arid scrub, and therefore, an easy arena for sightings, which is part of its natural charm. Many friends had vouched for this safari as notch better than Maasai Mara, more spectacular due to its endemic fauna not found commonly elsewhere. Grevy’s zebra, the largest of the species, with closely bunched stripes; reticulated giraffe with its liver-like pattern of patches; Gerenuk antelopes that stand on hind legs to browse through trees and the long-horned Beisa oryx reside here, exclusively. Our tour of Samburu was not the typical safari that you may read in travelogues, and here's why.    

As gleaned from newspaper reports, Samburu, to my mind, was notorious for its drought and for bandits from across the border in Somalia waylaying tourists. Two years back, a large part of the park was engulfed in flash floods in which few lodges were washed away and the tourists had to be airlifted to safety. This notoriety made Samburu seem like a distant, mysterious land. This December, unprecedented rains resulted in the flooding of the Ewaso Nyiro river on the edge of the park altering its ecology and climate, drastically. We were not sure if it would be prudent to go ahead with our visit, but a week-long dry spell was enough for me to stay on the original course.

Devastation wrought by flooding of Ewaso Nyiro river

Post-deluge, Samburu wore a green garb that was against its true nature. The desert of Samburu became an oasis, the sweltering savannah had become green and cool such that resident rangers had not witnessed in the past 30 years. The forest roads were dry river beds carved out by flooding waters of the fortnight before and at other places, sandy, with the soil swept down the eroded hillsides. Grass tussocks sprouted where the wheels of safari vehicles skirted the road centre. Dudus (insects) - bugs and beetles - buzzed at ground level, butterflies flitted about the white flowers bedecking low foliage, and birds - starlings and weavers - weaved in and out of trees and trailed skywards breathing life into the landscape.

The lodge where we camped for two days was severely undersubscribed; subsequent to Kenya’s military engagement with Somalia, tourists had been steering clear of the North-eastern circuit. There were just two other families apart from us, the turnout of security guards was at an all-time low, the police force was conspicuously absent and the resident doctor was on year-end leave!  The premises were not fenced (many game parks in Africa are not fenced as they are built to be in harmony with the natural surroundings and the wildlife) and at night an askari (security personnel) with a rungu (club) accompanied us to the dimly-lit dining area; it was not economically viable for the lodge to be comfortably lit up. In the pitch black night, with just the askari’s torch to feebly light up the ominous trees and bushes, we could only hope that we would survive the bush adventure. When asked how the askari protected himself from straying wildlife, this is what he had to say: “Usually elephants come by and when they approach us or are too close, we simply hurl the rungu at them and they disappear. We retrieve the rungu in the morning, and meanwhile, replace it with another.” I dared not contemplate the eventuality if the club were to miss the target or the gesture, itself, were to backfire!

Superb starling

Red-billed hornbill

Thicknee or Stone curlew

Vulturine guinea fowl

When daylight dawned, I stepped on to the verandah to greet the open plains, when an exotic-looking bird, identified later as the red-billed hornbill, made bold to land within a foot of me. As the day wore on, I realized that there was no getting away from hornbills - red-billed, yellow-billed or African grey - that hovered around us ubiquitously.  In Samburu, it is possible to take birds as tame but this perception is misplaced; they are as wild as nature designed them, it is just that they have been so protected and undisturbed here that they have come to trust humans totally. Add to that their own curiosity quotient for this strange two-legged creature and you’ll see why they are checking you out at close quarters. It appeared to me that Samburu resembled verdant Tsavo this season, where birds were more prominently visible than mammals. It is here for the first time that I saw the vulturine guinea fowl, country cousin to the helmeted guinea fowl, more abundantly observed in most other parks. Striking in its cobalt-blue plumage, the red-eye peers fearlessly into the camera. Similarly, a Thicknee (also called stone curlew) pattering by the roadside, stops as I reach out for my camera, faces me, and poses unafraid.

 

Kirk's Dik Dik

While the change in weather served us Nairobi-residents well, the weed that swarmed the acacia woods and hid the game was a spoilsport. The very sparseness of African savannas or woodlands affords unhindered viewing and enables easy sighting of wildlife. Dry weather or desert conditions also mean that the wildlife congregate or head towards water bodies, that predators and prey lurk around specific trajectories and can be trailed or tracked. But with plenty of rains and fodder, the animals disperse over a larger range making spotting a challenge. For a long time, all we saw were the dainty dik-diks and the gargantuan elephants. Doe-eyed dik-diks cavorting on the paths would jink in a sprightly manner and disappear in the bush at our advance. Kirk’s Dik Diks, often found in pairs, are so devoted to each other, that when one of them dies the other ‘commits suicide’. “When one of the pair dies, its partner gets so traumatized that it deliberately exposes itself to a predator,” says my son who is a better guide than the best ones I have come across!

Mousy-looking Gerenuk gazelle

In the African ‘jungles’ whether you see the big cats or not, whether you tick off the Big Five or not, you cannot miss the zebras.  But Samburu’s special species of zebra seemed to have crawled into the weed work! Grevy’s zebra were conspicuous by their absence and four game drives could not elicit their presence. We did see the mousy-faced Gerenuk antelope, but the glut of food meant that the antelopes had no need to stand on their hind legs and extend for out-of-reach foliage  - a quintessential  Samburu snapshot. A herd of Beisa Oryx, a desert species, presented itself but looked out of place in the prosperous veldt. Even as I was wowing the black stripes on their grey muscular bodies and their spear-like elongated horns, the guide hurtled past in unusual hurry. He had been alerted of lionesses nearby. Unknown to the Oryx, a lioness was stealthily stalking them and a tense drama was building up. “The lioness has to tackle the Oryx skilfully; any wrong move can result in the Oryx goring the lioness to death,” informs the guide. Why then, I wonder, does the lioness bother to hunt the Oryx when it can settle for an easier prey.

After a long interval sensing that it wasn’t going to be easy to hunt the herd through the thick tall foliage, the lioness relaxed and gave up the chase. In this park, at one point of time, a lioness and an Oryx had a strange association which has come to be a legend. More than a decade back, a lioness adopted an Oryx calf and took it under its wings. The lioness’ motherly instincts toward the Oryx were so strong that after the calf died due to starvation, it went on to adopt another, this time allowing it to go to its biological mother for suckling! Of course, the calf fell prey to a male lion, as was bound to happen.   

Perhaps, the most memorable Samburu scene would be that of a leopard, at dusk, resting nonchalantly, silhouetted against an olive tree. It is a fitting finale that where the foliage had swallowed all animals away from sight  we should see the ever-elusive and reclusive cat openly dangling in air. But above all, Samburu is a land of elephants. We saw waves upon waves of elephant clans, contentedly, foraging through the greens, so close we could have touched them if we wanted to!

Note: Safari Salama is a greeting in KiSwahili which translates as "Bon Voyage" or "...Good trip".






All Photographs in this blog and website are the Author's Original work/Copyright. 

Forest of Small Things

 This time it is a walk on an "Elephant Trail" of a primeval forest inland off Mombasa coast. It is not a planned tour and it is almost by chance that my son and I saunter into Arabuko-Sokoke forest on our way back from Gedi Ruins, what was a four-century old town. 

Peter, the forest ranger is accompanying us with bare essentials of a stick (not a club, forget a rifle) under the darkened canopy of dense woodland. We drive some distance into the jungle, park our car on the deserted path, lock it to keep baboons and monkeys from mischief, and set out on foot to unearth forest life. The car looks vulnerable - abandoned and out of place. I idly wonder what if an African elephant were to get too curious about it. Peter assures us about the safety of the car and herds us on to the dirt track which is getting narrower hemmed in as it is with tall trees and lianas.

Lanky Peter walks with a stoop looking surreptitiously to the left and right, up and down, stops suddenly and moves on. His antennas are working taking in the sweep of the forest - for sounds and sights - which for us is a soundless blur of twigs and leaves. This is a regular route of Arabuko’s resident African elephants. Unlike its Asian counterpart, the African elephant has never been tamed or domesticated adding to its “wildness quotient”. I ask Peter if it is not dangerous to come face to face with one. His reply is an amused, indulgent smile. We simply follow in his wake trusting in him completely; we have no choice now that we have crossed the Rubicon. We desperately try to mute our footfalls crunching dry twigs and leaves so as not to attract unwanted attention.  Suddenly, Peter turns to us dramatically and whispers conspiratorially: "Elephant shh...", much to our consternation.

Peter keeps his gaze to the ground and this “elephant shh…” routine is repeated several times, threatening to make nervous wrecks of us. And yet no elephant emerges from the woodwork. While we do hope that we see an African elephant in flesh and blood, we also pray that none crosses our path. We have heard of freak incidents involving tourists and elephants in Mt. Kenya and elsewhere. Peter insists that elephants are very shy and gentle creatures, but our urban minds fail to comprehend this. An hour into the walk the elephants that Peter senses elude us; we are getting impatient and skittish.

It turns out that, all along, Peter has been pointing out the pint-sized “elephant shrew” scurrying on ground, perhaps into its hole, even before we could set eyes on it!

A word about the “elephant shh…rew”! The Golden-rumped Elephant shrew is a fascinating mousy animal that traces its ancestry back to nearly 100 million years. The name is a bit of a misnomer, though, as this ancient insectivorous mammal is more closely related to an elephant or a hyrax rather than a shrew, as zoologists categorize it. This discrepancy has been sought to be rectified by zoologists by giving it a local Bantu name, sengi. The Golden-rumped sengi is endemic to African scrub forests and is a highly endangered species.

What was happening here was that every time Peter spotted an elephant shrew foraging in leaf litter and indicated it to us we missed it due to our obsession with elephants. By the time we realize our mistake and train our sights on the forest floor, it is too late. The fast-footed sengi, elusive and shy, as well, gives us the slip time and again.

Arabuko-Sokoke’s threatened endemic bird species - Sokoke’s pipit, Sokoke’s Scops owl or Amani sunbird – too seem elusive as we are on an afternoon walk when bird activity is at its lowest. And we are glad that we do not cross paths with a boomslang or a green mamba. But we see few psychedelic fungi and innumerable trees and plant species. Peter shows us Antlions on the sandy stretches of Mida Creek where we end at a tree-top to get a bird’s eye-view of the forest. So though we do not see elephants, elephant shrew or rare birds, we learn about the small five, for the first time. And these are the Elephant shrew, Rhino beetle, Antlion, Leopard tortoise and Buffalo weaver. Can you guess why they are called the small five!

Savannas with their Big Five may be the quintessence of Africa, but coastal forests such as Arabuko are a reminder that the African continent was once covered in tropical forests. Arabuko-Sokoke is rich in biodiversity of endangered flora and fauna. It is a  UNESCO Biosphere Reserve - a status given for its conservation efforts brought through community involvement.

As I step out of the forest and out of the time warp, I find myself repeating this line from Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s poem, quite out of context: “And here were forests as ancient as the hills…” 

Not Just Another Safari

Tsavo National Park

Sometimes, it is not what you see in a place, but what the place has seen that makes it special. Tsavo country is predominantly elephant territory, also notorious for its real-life legend of man-eater lions, but it is possible that tourists on safari may not see either. Tsavo National Park in South Kenya is sprawling, the size of Israel as the entrance sign-board declares. Perhaps, for this reason, it is not very popular with the camera-toting tourists who seek to count their lions and tick off the Big Five.

The convolvulus has swamped the sward, their white bells trailing the shape of the trees, shrubs, bushes that are tucked underneath. And though the tableau is mesmerizing to our touristy eyes, these are invasive ipomeas (better known as morning glory) that have taken over the bush! White petals cleave from the carpet – it seems - as butterflies legion as flowers flit about the low ground. The noon-time hushed bush is soundlessly alive. Not to be outdone, birds – hornbills and spurfowls, weavers and shrikes - fill the airspace and verge, but thankfully, these are of Tsavo nativity.

The trails we follow throw up leopard pugs and elephant hooves, intermittently, but not their owners. Bare boles stripped of leaves and twigs show signs of elephant ravages, but the perpetrators of carnage are nowhere in sight. That is how it is in Tsavo country, the excitement lies more in the suggestion than in the spotting. After hours of following the red dirt tracks through the acacia-commiphora woodlands all we see is a herd of elephants walking into the horizon. Should a small herd of elephants walking away into distance - a pastiche at once of mundanity and mystery - be any less thrilling than an elephant at close quarters posing for a photograph? For me, this is a more intimate impression, almost as if the elephants were leading me into their private domain, if only I exerted my imagination and followed them there. The lions, too, are elusive just as they were, more than a century ago, when the “Uganda Railway” was under construction and when they attacked nearly hundred labourers by the bridge on river Tsavo.

In 1900, this peaceful haven was torn asunder, rivened into two halves – east and west - by the Lunatic Line (as it came to be called by some who did not believe in the project), the blatant transgression bringing the wrath of two lions upon the railway party. Even after being aware and alerted, the spectre of the lions haunted the labourer camp claiming lives, prominent among them Superintendent Charles Ryall who had set up a trap to entice the beasts. This episode of the man-eating lions has been documented by Lt. Col. J.H. Patterson in his classic account “The Man-eaters of Tsavo”. In a riveting tale much like Jim Corbett’s escapade in the Indian jungles, Col. Patterson documents how two maneless lions had held Tsavo in a “state of siege” for nearly 10 months, before he ultimately gunned them down. Incidentally, the movie, “The Ghost and the Darkness” based on the incidents takes cinematic liberty in showing two nomadic lions, perhaps because lions with luxuriant manes can strike fear in the hearts as no hairless feline can.

But it is what Richie, the lodge naturalist, told me later that caught my fancy more. Researchers believe that the ‘man-eating’ genes of that notorious duo still survives having been passed down over the years! Is it any less thrilling to go to bed in the darkness of the cabin and step in the shoes of the labourers in their camp and ‘live’ their experience, even if you have not seen a lion stride by in the bush during the day? Is it any less thrilling to hear the wardens, some of them women, recount their tales of wildlife encounter as they go about their duty of patrolling the woodlands, sometimes even on foot? Listening to them and Richie’s stories of being caught between two rival herds of aggressive elephants or witnessing night hunts is enough to bring Tsavo alive in my mind’s eye.

Subsequently, we do spot more of Tsavo’s famous “red elephants”, particularly in the East. Elephants indulge in mudbath to keep them cool and the soil of Tsavo being ochre, they take on a brick-red hue. A silver-backed jackal comes in a cameo and slinks away into the undergrowth while gazelles – kudus and impalas – make guest appearances, periodically. The hum of life subtly unfolds like the tip of the proverbial iceberg, here.

The lodge we were staying in, Kilaguni, is the first lodge to be established in any of the national parks of Kenya. A bare bones structure of logs, the sit-out allows the luxury of taking in the panoramic sweep of the volcanic Chyulu Hills as though one were out in the open. After dark, we sit, underneath the stars - well almost, watching the impalas by the watering hole. Suddenly, they are alert perking their ears even as the staff alerts us of a leopard heading here. We learn that this is a “resident” leopard that the hotel staff has been feeding to lure it for the tourists. While that took the edge out of the encounter, watching the elusive predator in real form still held awe and shock. Even as the panther was watching us - the gawking tourists, in the instant that he returned my gaze, I averted mine with alacrity not wanting to send wrong vibes. In retrospect, I realized that the brief locking of our eyes mirrored our minds, both revealing fear – of each other!

At the base of the Chyulu Hills is the hardened lava floor, charcoal-black, called Shetani lava flows. Shetani is Kiswahili for “devil”, the guide informs, and it is obvious that the moniker derives from “shaitan”. It is not difficult to imagine that more than 200 years back when fire must have spewed from the belly of the earth, people must have thought it the handiwork of the Devil. At Shetani, we get down and explore the cindered floor which can sustain no plant life, but we have to be wary of fauna that might saunter around. I pick up some lava rocks as souvenir to add to my collection of “precious stones”.

Tsavo habitat hides many a sting. Mzima Springs framed by bamboo and bulrush is certainly one of them. The crystal clear waters of the spring are said to be fed by the melting snows of Kilimanjaro - that seep from underneath the Chyulu Hills -  and which in turn feed the entire city of Mombasa! Once again, we set on foot and the tranquility tricks us into believing that we are at a recreation zone. But the guide is quick to rid us of our false comfort. He narrates an incident where an errant tourist went too close to the pool to take a photograph despite warnings and became the meal of a Nile crocodile that lunged out of the water. Back in the lodge, Richie insisted on showing us the documentary, “Haunt of the Riverhorse” on Mzima Springs; it may well have been some other place, surely not the one we saw! The film takes you under water into a unique ecosystem where thickly populated hippopotami form the pivot, their dung serving as the organic substratum sustaining fish and other submarine life! We did not see the hippos or the crocs at the spring that day like we have, time and again, on various safaris at other parks. Despite that Mzima Springs was certainly special because of what it hid in its bosom, because of what we witnessed virtually, through the film.

We can’t boast of ample game spotting or great wildlife encounters, first hand, in Tsavo, but seeing the place through “expert” eyes and being aware of what is brewing beneath the surface, behind the scenes, makes this safari incomparable. Unlike Maasai Mara, where species outdo each other in “sightings”, Tsavo’s riches scattered that they are throughout its existence, need to be mined like gold.