Lake Nakuru and Lake Naivasha (Day 3-4)

Miranda Jensen
Jul 6, 2020
6 min read

Updated: Sep 12, 2023

Bencia Africa Adventure & Safaris +254722917288

- 4 day tour Masai Mara

- $ 840 a piece

- Rating (Tour and Guide)- 4/5

Lake Nakuru day 3

It took a long time to drive from Masi Mara to Lake Nakuru. Along the way we stopped for lunch and said bye to the couple who was with us for the first 2.5 days of the trip. Then continued on our almost 6 hour drive to the lakes.

Lake Nakuru is known for its rhinos and even has an Rhino sanctuary. Unlike Masi Mara it is fenced by an electric fence that helps protect the animals from poachers as well as keeps them from getting out. It also has paved paths to take around the park while Masi Mara were just dirt (and most of the time we were there mud) paths. They are also quite famous for the flamingos that like to make the shores their home. Though when we went our guide said the algae they eat was in short supply that year so there weren't as many birds. The endangered Rothschilds's giraffe also makes this park its home (the same giraffes at the giraffe manner and the giraffe sanctuary.)

When we arrived we only had an hour tell night fall we did get to see our first rhino almost right away into the park. It was quite a distance away though already down for the day looking more like a large bolder in the distance. With it being late we didn't see much but a few zebras and some warthogs before heading to our new camp for the night.

We stayed at the Lake Nakuru Lodge it was very nice! After we had dinner we went down to see the traditional dancing, it was raining and threats of thunder storms by the time it was going to start so we got to watch the dance inside. They had quite a bit of different styles of dances going on.

One of the women dancing had the same energy dancing as my sister and even looked enough like her to make my mom and I emotional during the dance. In the end the invited people up to dance with them and we could just imagine my sister going up and having fun with them. We stayed tell everyone else left and bought a dvd of their dancing. Then talked with them we told them of how she reminded us of my late sister and got some more friends in Kenya! We ended the night with dinner and then our first massages my mom got a hour foot massage for $25 while I got a full body hour massage for $35! And again we made another friend with the masseuse and still talk with all of them to this day! When we went back to our room we laughed that they had put a hot water bottle in our bed when it was around 70s at night!

Day 4

In the morning our safari continued, driving along the coast of Nakuru lake. We saw a few flamingos but not very many apparently their food supply was more abundant around the only lake in Kenya that has malaria so we said they could stay over that way! We did how ever see a lot of pelicans in the water and flying over head.

My favorite part about this park though by far was all of the rhinos we got to see! At this park we saw mostly southern white rhinos, and this was the first time we got to see one close up! As we were driving we were seeing one out in a field, our very helpful guide told us that it was a bull rhino and they are most of the time alone for the female usually goes on her own after mating. Though right after he was saying this a mother and her calf passed right in front of us and went and joined the male across the road.

While driving around we did get to see the Rothschilds's giraffes too. We saw a family hiding out amongst the trees eating. They even had a little baby along with them. These giraffes were put on the endangered list back in 2010 for being the second most threatened type of giraffe. While it is difficult to get a accurate number there are approximately 1,399 mature Rothschild giraffes in the wild. When going to Kenya's famous giraffe manner or the adjacent giraffe sanctuary these are the same types of giraffes you will see.

Next we were slowly driving around when we heard a jumble of excited words come over the speaker. Our driver spoke into the radio and then started racing through the paths. When we got to where we were going there were a few other trucks but not many yet, our guide started looking around. It wasn't tell we asked what we were supposed to be looking for did he tell us. Drivers are in the habit of not telling tourists what it is they are looking for so that they do not disappoint them. We told all of our drivers that we understand things might be hiding or hard to find and that we want to know what is supposed to be there even if we miss what it is at least we got a chance to look too. He then told us we were looking for a leopard! There were plenty of antelopes in the grass to one side of us I was scanning the grass trying to see if I could see anything lurking there. And then our driver spotted it up on the cliff the leopard was hiding scanning the grass on its own trying to find its next meal, or so we assumed. We stayed here for quite some time getting a lot of pictures! It wasn't until more cars started arriving that the large cat noticed we were there at all. Once it seemed done with us it crawled back into the brush and disappeared. We waited a little to see if it would come back out or come out from the back side but it didn't.

Lake Naivasha

Hippo rides in lake Naivasha was our next destination. This is the only lake in the rift that is fresh water due to the culmination of the rift valley floor. The depression that makes the lake is formed by the tectonic plates pulling away from each other. We paid $30 apiece (cash) to take a boat out into the lake to be with the hippos. Not having sweat glands hippos have to stay in the water they come up every 5 minuets for air. By standing on their back feet and sticking their heads out, for hippos can not actually swim due to their sizes they just float.

We meet up with our tour guide and went into a 14 food long boat that was about 3 feet wide to go out into the large lake to be one with the hippos. Our guide was like a hippo whisper, we would trolling along he would point to an area and tell us to wait a hippo was about to surface and then they would pop up! We got to see lots of families of hippos bopping their heads up and breathing out of the water. And even some babies up close! Our guide kept us at a distance to not stress out the cows with their young but he was also amazed they were not seeing us as a threat and said we were lucky to be able to get so close.

Much of the lake is surrounded by forests of the yellow barked Acacia Xanthophlea, known as the yellow fever tree. They got this name because when the English came they noticed that people around these trees tended to catch malaria. Naivasha is known as a world class birding destination, abound with bird life.

White breasted Cormorant

We saw all kinds of birds when we were out on the water, even going up and under a tree where we got to look into some of the birds nests. One of the types we saw was a village weaver or black-headed weaver. This weaver builds a large nest that is coarsely woven at a downward facing entrance made out of grass and leaf strips and suspended from a branch in a tree. Each nest has two false entrances and one real one to trick predators from entering.

Many nests are in the same hung in the same tree for these birds are colonial breeders and can lay two to three eggs.

More pictures of the birds in the Lake Nakuru and Lake Naivasha gallary.