Hell's Gate National Park, Kenya

I think Scott and I might be the only souls in Hell’s Gate National Park. Well, if you count all the animals in this park, there are probably thousands of souls. I’ll revise that. Scott and I may be the only tourist souls in this park. Our tent is perched atop a ridge that overlooks the park.

Earlier this evening, we could see zebras and buffalo. And prior to that, we were walking among them. What attracted us to Hell’s Gate was the fact that it’s a walkable park. So that’s what we did. We woke up this morning at Fisherman’s Camp at Lake Naivasha. As we drank tea and coffee, we watched Vervet monkeys jump and play, and monkey around so much on one particular branch that it broke off scaring the large birds around it. There’s an electrical fence around the camp so no hippo sightings but definitely hippo hearings in the middle of the night and early this morning. After breakfast we packed up and started hoofing it on the highway. It was around 5 km to the park turn off so I was happy to jump on a matatu. Once we got to the turn off, we walked the 2 km down a dusty road to the park entrance. That was the most extended walking we’ve done with our heavy packs (Scott’s being much heavier than mine) and I wasn’t too keen, naturally, but we made it to the gate.

After paying East African resident rates to get into the park – 500 Kenyan shillings (around US$6.25) for entry, 150 shillings (less than US$2) for camping versus US$25 for entry and $15 for camping – Scott started performing surgery on his shorts again, which had ripped further during our morning matatu ride. This drew the attention of others entering the gate including a nice man from Manitoba. I was hoping to hitch a ride to the campsite instead of hiking the two miles with our packs, and that’s what the nice man from Manitoba (Roger) offered. Him and his wife in their private safari van offered us a ride and we took it happily. We hung out with Roger and Eleanor for the next couple hours as we rode with them to the gorge and walked with them.

The gorge was spectacular, certainly the highlight of the park for most who see Hell’s Gate as part of a day trip package around the area. Scott had said it’d be similar to slot canyons found in the west in America, and it was.

We ended up walking with another group as well for some of it, but it was still amazing. The gorge also had a hot springs system and tons of obsidian. We ended up walking from the depths of the gorge high onto a lookout. After the gorge, Roger and Elinor dropped us off at our campsite turnoff and went on with their day’s adventure. We’ve been lucky with the kindness of strangers we’ve received – strangers who travel by more guided/driven ways. Layla and Rob in Robundo Island National Park – from sharing costs with them on the island to getting the free ride to Bukoba; Mike and Chris who allowed us to share their cab ride from the campsite in Jinja (I’m sad I lost her business card with my journal); and now Roger and Eleanor – just really kind fellow travelers.

After we walked 2 km to the camp, Scott set up the tent while I prepared lunch. We started going around 1:30, having already done the gorge (thankfully since it was a 6.5 km walk), and headed toward the obsidian caves, another 6.5 km away. Without the big packs, the walking was fine, just hot. It’s definitely a different vantage point to see the zebras, the warthogs, gazelles and giraffes from foot rather than from high up in a safari rig.

For the most part the animals just stared back at us before running away sometimes. I love the warthogs who run away in a single file line with their tails up straight like antennas. We walked in the hot sun to the obsidian caves, which were definitely obsidian, but not really caves. Scott was disappointed but I just thought it was a good walk and was happy to reach somewhere so we could head back.

We briefly followed the Twiga Loop thinking it would be bring us back to where we needed to be, but it didn’t and when it didn’t, instead of backtracking, Scott wanted to take a shortcut down some gravely hills and through some woods. It wasn’t enjoyable for me but it did lead us to a great vantage point for buffalo. It was around 5 pm (the reason why Scott wanted to take the shortcut; to get back with some light still), which is usually around the time when buffalo come out from the woods. When we first saw them, I said, “shit.” Scott said, “cool.” I’m not afraid to walk among zebras and gazelles, but buffalo I am. We continued on and encountered groups of zebras, a particularly large one by a manmade watering hole. Scott tried to see how close he could get; I kept my distance.

The day was spectacular. It was just a truly amazing feeling to walk by zebras and giraffes, to walk with them. It was one of those days when I felt really lucky to be traveling, to be in Africa, and to be with Scott, because in so many ways he makes this all happen.

It’s early, but it’s nice to be in the tent. We can’t see them now, but we’re under a blanket of stars and among many other souls.