Today we were up a tad earlier than usual, as we were traveling over to the Mt. Elgon area. After about 3 hours of driving, along with a nice pit stop of getting the Land Cruiser out of a mud ditch, our first destination was Mt. Elgon Flowers This company/land /area is a rose farm, and sends about 1 million roses to to Europe (and some to Japan) each month. The company is owed by a Dutch/Swedish (now Kenyan because it is now 3rd generation-operated) family. It's an absolutely huge business and is extremely successful. First, we had a short tour of the rose processing, and got to go into two of their hundreds of greenhouses. Each greenhouse is FILLED with rose buds, and a full rose for each type being grown. They were all so beautiful, and were so colorful. Then we saw the room where they package/cut the roses, which are put on a truck that drives overnight to Nairobi and flown to Europe, arriving with 3-4 days. It's quite the process. Another part of the company, which the family has been able to start and support with the extra earnings from the rose farm, are projects that include a hospital/medical clinic, orphanage, school, and houses for their workers. It's truly amazing work, and the perfect example of practicing corporate, social responsibility. As we toured these facilities, I was floored by how nice and the amazing conditions that all the facilities were in. They're even starting up vocational classes, like carpentry and sewing. This family has doe such good work serving and helping the community.
SUNDAY
Our weekend journey continued as we left the game reserve and went to Mt. Elgon National Park. We drove for a while (and saw waterbucks), before getting out to go visit Kitum Cave, where elephants come in the early mornings to lick the sal off the walls. It was SUCH a dirty hike. Wet, muddy, the whole shebang. But, one we got inside the cave, it was really cool. There were bats everywhere and we walked really far back into it. Ryoan definitely deserves hero/step-in father of the day as he carried Ethan (Annette's 1 year old son) through every step of muddiness and all the places we went-including crossing a stream. This cave, according to DAD and "The Hot Zone," was the origin of the Ebola virus! Pretty neat. Then, we took a long hike across the mountain to another cave, Mackingeny Cave. I have to say, this was probably the best hike of my life. I was walking with Somer and Gideon, and we were separated in the middle of the pack. Twice on our hike we ran into some tricky/super muddy sections, where Gideon decided it would be a great idea to commentate our maneuvering of the parts, making Somer and I fall to pieces laughing while trying to complete the obstacle course. I don't think I have laughed that hard in a long time. We, after a stream crossing and most muddy climbing section, got to the second cave. Again, we walked a little ways into the cave, but quickly turned around to head back down the mountains. We set off again to continue through the park, but were stopped as we discovered the mutatu had a flat tire, and breaked for lunch as it got fixed. We then made a last second decision to go to the elephant lookout instead of another hike. I like to think that everything happens for a reason, and this situation was no different as right as we took the other road, we saw two giraffes strolling along a patch of green overlooking a beautiful view. It was pretty sweet how they just appeared out of nowhere and were so quiet and majestic, looking right at us as we snapped multiple pics. We stopped at the view and spent a while hanging out and soaking in the scenery before moving onward. Just as we were leaving the park, we were graced by the presence of an entire field of baboons and babies, and more waterbucks.
Kwaheri
--Stuart
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