Off to the Aberdares!

I have a busy two weeks coming up at work where it looks like I will have few days off, so we have decided to go on a 2-3 day safari to Aberdare National Park which is in a mountainous region north of Nairobi.

The park is quite different from other parks found in Kenya. It encloses two different environments: moorland, peaks and forest atop a high plateau, and an outcrop of dense rainforest known as the Salient. Because of this the park is in stark contrast to the open savannah of Amboseli, Masai Mara, and previous parks we've been to.

Aberdare National Park was formed in 1950 to protect the forested slopes and moors of the Aberdare Mountains (the 4 main peaks in the park range from 3500m to 4000m). The dominant species are elephant (which we still have yet to see in the wild) and buffalo, but there are also chances of seeing black rhinos, spotted hyenas, bongo antelope, bush pigs, and black leopards! The terrain however is a bit rough, and the roads can get quite muddy when there is a lot of rain. Because of this the park is rarely visited by safari companies, and even less by individual travelers! Of course this is very enticing to us.... (and Battlecat of course).

Here is a shot from Google Earth, with just a bit of the data from Tracks4Africa overlayed. The Rift Valley is to the east, and you can see the park (outlined in green) is all up in the lush vegetation of the hills (click to enlarge).


On top of the mammals I just mentioned there are hundreds of bird species present, and in general the park has varieties of fauna, flora, and scenery not found elsewhere in east Africa. We are especially looking forward to the Gura falls, which drop 300m down into the thick forest.

We'll be back on Thursday!