Sheldrick Wildlife Trust


Woke up pre-dawn on Tuesday morning to have our private experience with the giraffes. They all have names and individual personalities. I was shocked by the massive presence of Kelly waiting outside our door. Kelly is pregnant by another giraffe Ed, who is also a regular at the manor. She is halfway through her 15 month gestation period. We also saw Selma, whom our room was named after.  Once we settled back inside for breakfast, the giraffes stuck their heads in through the windows where we could feed and pet them further. Quite an amazing experience!



After breakfast, we left Giraffe Manor and our driver took us through Nairobi National Park, a massive wildlife preserve within the borders of the actual city.  Then, the highlight of the day - the Sheldrick Wildlife Trust.  We had a private appointment, which came with our donation of a certain dollar amount.  There were 27 orphaned elephants in residence, along with a blind black rhino and baby black rhino.  We witnessed the morning bottle feeding (they use massive amounts of human baby formula) and were allowed interact with the elephants for over 30 minutes  Their ages ranged from 1-5yrs old.  At 5yrs, they are gradually reintroduced to the wild at Tsavo National Park in southeast Kenya over another 5 year period.  Each elephant has its own stable and, Interestingly, a keeper sleeps with each one until they are 2yrs old  This prevents loneliness and facilitates the feedings which initially occur every 3 hours.










Baby black rhino Raha.  Just over 1yr old but the size of a 6 month old. Has had  6 surgeries after a predator attacked her



Mature blind black rhino Max

After our incredible experience at Sheldrick, we toured the nearby Karen Biden house (of Out of Africa fame) and had lunch at the Karen Blixen Lodge down the street. Today was Independence Day in Kenya, marking 60 years free of British colonial rule. Unfortunately, our airport was shut down for much of our day, delaying our flight to the Masai Mara by a couple of hours. Not a great hardship and the wait was well worth it. We hopped into our 12-seat Cessna (kind of like a. Heavy Tahoe with wings) and arrived at our destination around 5pm

Comments

  1. André says: It's a lot of work for the staff

    ReplyDelete
  2. What an adventurous trip

    ReplyDelete
  3. Do you have photos of the Blixen house and grounds?

    ReplyDelete

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