Lake Nakuru National Park

We had breakfast before 7 and we all met out front at 7.15am. The park is only a 10 minute drive from this part of town. After the Masai Mara, Lake Nakuru is Kenya's most popular park, due to the prescene of many birds, guaranteed sightings of white rhino and other wildlife. As soon as we entered the park, huge herds of cape buffalo were lying in the grass in the distance. We drove through some forest surrounding the lake and saw many waterbucks. In the open grassland we came very close to a white rhino family, 2 adults and one young. Zebra, impala, grant's gazelle and thomson's gazelle were all fairly abundant. A pair of spotted hyena's walked briskly in the distance and we were able to intercept their direct path a while later. One of them walked close to the back of our van and I was able to get a decent photo. We ascended a hill that leads to a viewpoint on a cliff. I could see the whole park and lake from here, since the park isn't that big.
Rock hyraxes are often seen here according to Animal. The rock hyrax is a small animal that looks kind of like a groundhog/guinea pig and is more closely related to elephants, believe it or not, due to its dental arrangement. This animal produces a blood curdling scream at night and I heard them while in our camp in the Masai Mara. There is also the tree hyrax which lives in the rainforest and I heard their scary screams in the forests of Ghana. Unfortunately I haven't seen either one of these mysterious animals yet. I scanned the cliffs and was lucky to spot 4 of them just relaxing down below on some rocks. I was so happy to finally see them.
We drove the high road behind the cliff and saw a white rhino, the adorable Kirk's dik dik and the rothschild giraffe, a subpecies different that the masai giraffe in the mara. We descended back to lake level and drove close to the waters edge. We stopped here and were able to get out of the van. Just back from the shore were reclining rhinos and buffaloes, so we stayed away from them. Lake Nakuru has huge nubmers of pelican, storks, and lesser and greater flamingoes. The lesser flamingoes feed on the algae which in turn gives them their pink color. Their numbers rise and fall with the lake levels. We continued driving around the lake, through more forest. Leopards and monkeys are often seen but with all our scanning we couldn't find any.
We left the park around noon and went for lunch in Nakuru town. We ate a delicious lunch of breaded tilapia fillets and french fries. Gala and Colandra would be heading back to Nairobi but I'm going west, no need to go back to Nairobi. I'm so glad I'm done with that city until I leave to go home. I won't be going to any other city as big or as potentially dangerous. Animal took me to the Muko Hotel and I got a room literally on the roof. There was only 2 rooms on the roof and I took the one. This worked out great too because I had a lot of clothes to wash and there was somewhere to wash and tons of clothes lines. I washed my clothes and took a nap and when I awoke they were all dry. It was a sunny day and most of my things are light and quick drying. I went out to write the blog and then have dinner. It was about 8pm when I finished writing and the town seemed almost asleep. As Kenya's third largest town with a population of 163,000, I didn't expect this. I did find an open restaurant and had another tilapia with chips washed down by the local tasy brew, Tusker. Things aren't super cheap in Kenya, it takes some effort to find cheaper prices but even then they aren't that cheap. I've had my cheapest bottle of Tusker last night actually, about $1.50 for a 500mL bottle. Tomorrow I will be leaving Nakuru to head west to Kisumu on the shores of Lake Victoria.