Mission to Kenya: Monday, July 16

*This morning, people are inquiring of each other, ‘Who felt the earthquake?’ Apparently, a little before midnight, a fairly substantial quake rocked the continent, with its epicenter south of us in Tanzania. It was accompanied by several aftershocks, and it was significant enough to have had the attention of the local staff.

*Today’s safari has been a great success. The ‘king’ was finally spotted, with his pride enjoying last night’s kill of a ‘wildabeast’.

Michael Legg provided a brief overview of the patterns of a male lion’s ‘pride’ (the word for a male and his group of female lions and cubs). Most never become very large because there is only ever one male who is constantly fighting off competition. If the competitor wins, the losing male walks away alone, a very sad and pathetic sight, I’m told. The new head of the pride will then kill his predecessors cubs and begin again.

The lion is also, we’re told, a particularly lazy animal, lounging under the bushes and trees only until it is necessary to come out and hunt. They hunt in packs and often very strategically. One lioness will go upwind, sending the prey downwind into an ambush by the rest of the pride.

We asked our driver who the Masai fear, who we regularly see walking across the park. ‘They fear the elephants and the buffalo, but the cats they fend off with their own special repellent recipe of cow dung and other secret ingredients.

*The rest of the day has been spent on the road from the lodge to the Methodist Guest House in Nairobi. Accommodations here are lovely, but the roads have been brutal. Another long day on them, and we’re all glad to be off – now, I believe, for the last time.

All the St. Paul’s L’Amoreaux folk are in one piece, reunited and in good spirits.