Pics from Masai Mara 2007 - 1

This is the first in a series of posts on our safari in the Masai Mara Game Reserve in Kenya this past July. We went to Kenya primarily to attend the All-Africa Missionary Conference, a bi-annual meeting of Church of Christ and Christian Church missionaries. Once we were over there, however, how could we not resist taking in a safari?

Our trip was pretty low-budget as far as safaris in East Africa goes. We slept in tents, ate in pretty rustic dinning hall (the food was great though) and shared a bath house with the rest of the campers. Our friends from Dallas, Suzanne, Anna and Will Sager were with us along with another Dallas friend Ro Diaz. It was definitely the trip of a lifetime.

We saw lots of lions during our 4 day, 3 night trip. I think the total was 15. This lion was sitting in the middle of the road at high noon, trying to stay cool. She moved over to the shade of our van pretty soon after we stopped to take some pictures.

These cheetahs were probably the ‘crown jewel’ of our trip. We spent 2 1/2 days looking for these guys before we saw them on our last game drive. There were actually 3 cheetahs (we were told they were brothers) but I didn’t get any picture of all of them together. You’ll see more of them in future posts.

While the lions and cheetahs were awesome, I think my favorite animals to see were the giraffes. I was blown away by their height and grace. I loved seeing them, whether they were up close or far, far off in the distance. Maybe the fact that I don’t have any chance of seeing them in our ‘home’ game park of Pendjari made me appreciate them more… Anyways, this picture was taken as a herd of 12 giraffes crossed in front of our van. It was really cool. (The picture in the header of the blog was taken at during the same encounter.)

Well, that’s it for now. I’ll post a few more pictures in a day or two. Let me know what you think!