Travelling Experiences 5

KENYA

In 1995, our son Dale, and I went on a trip to Kenya with a group sponsored by the University of Alberta.  The main group flew from Edmonton to Nairobi, where Dale, who was living in Copenhagen, joined us. Nairobi, the capital of Kenya is a city with a population of more than three million people.  There are significant contrasts in the city, as shown in the views below.

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Mount Kilmanjaro, a dormant volcano, is located in Tanzania, the neighboring country.   With an altitude of 5,895 meters it is the dominant feature in East Africa and can be seen from many countries, including Kenya.  

We proceeded, by bus, to the Mount Kenya Club, where we spent two nights.  This Club was established to cater to wealthy tourists who came to Kenya to hunt the wild animals.      

The main attraction for tourists in Kenya is the wide variety of animals.  Some of more common and better known are pictured here.

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On our way to Masai Mara we stopped at Lake Nakuru. This is the home of hundreds of thousands of flamingos.  They feed on the shrimp which live in the lake.  

Masai Mara is the homeland for the Masai people.  They are noted for raising cattle.  To protect the cattle from predators, such as lions, they bring the cattle into their villages at night, which have surrounding walls, made of posts between the huts.

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The Mara River is home to many hippopotamuses. They spend their days in the river to avoid the hot sun and at night travel up to twenty-five kilometers in search of food.  We returned to Nairobi for our flights back to Canada and Denmark.

ANTARCTICA

In January, 1996, I went on an expedition to Antarctica with a group from Elderhostel.  We assembled in Toronto and flew to Buenos Aires, Argentina.  From there we flew on to Ushuaia, at the southern tip of Argentina.  This was midsummer in the Southern Hemisphere. In Ushuaia, we boarded the ship that would take us to Antarctica. The ship had been built for the Russian Navy as a submarine detector.  It was being used in the tourist industry as a revenue generator. The ship was equipped with very sensitive sound equipment.  It was said that one would be able to hear people talking in Tokyo. We did not have the opportunity to verify the story by actually experiencing this.

The crew were nearly all Russians.  The Russian waitresses’ knowledge of English extended to being able to ask us, “Do you want meet or feesh”?  Despite this apparent lack of choice, the food was good and we enjoyed the meals. The tour director was an American with several years of experience at McMurdo Station, the American base in Antarctica.

The weather was very windy on our trip south from Ushuia, so we stayed inside the ship.  My roommate was a retired Baptist minister from Chicago. We were fortunate to have one of the better cabins that had originally been used by the captain, and had plenty of room. Some of the other members of the group were located in smaller cabins and felt crowded.

On our voyage the tour director, who was very knowledgeable and also happened to be a good raconteur, provided information about the area we were going to visit.  He had many interesting stories based on his years of service at McMurdo Station.  Unfortunately, I do not remember many of the details.

Our first stop was scheduled to be at an abandoned whaling station. However, the weather was so bad that the captain decided he could not anchor there. So we sailed on. The next day the weather had improved significantly and we were able to enjoy the scenery.  I had never thought that ice could come in so many shades of color.  It is unfortunate that these cannot be seen clearly in the pictures.

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The following day, we went ashore, for the first time, to explore the penguins. The two types of penguins that are common in the area we visited are the Chinstrap and the Gentoo.

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There are several other different types of penguins in Antarctica that live in other parts of the continent and on various islands.  They tend to be similar in lifestyles, eating fish and krill, for example.  The most well-known of these is the Emperor Penguin, which is very different.  For example, the Chinstrap and Gentoo Penguins raise their chicks in the summer and the Emperors raise theirs in the winter.  They do not build nests and hatch the single egg by taking turns keeping the egg warm on their feet.  The other partner goes looking for food and they exchange roles periodically through the winter.

An Emperor Penguin family.   Only one egg is hatched each season.  The chick would still have to be fed by the parents until it is old enough to go into the water.  Emperors are significantly bigger than Chinstraps and Gentoos.  

The two most common flight-capable birds are the Albatross and the Skua.  The Albatross spends most of its life at sea, feeding on fish and coming to land primarily to nest.

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The Skua is a land bird that eats penguin chicks and any other food it can find. 

The other principal predator of penguins is the Leopard Seal.

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This tiny creature is the basic food for many marine birds and animals, including baleen whales.  Typically krill are only two centimeters long, so it takes an enormous number of them to feed a large animal like a whale.  Krill are also eaten by people in some countries.

As we were cruising along the edge of the ice sheet we came to an interesting looking cavern in the edge of the ice floe.  The captain stopped the ship and a group of us went to explore the cavern in a small boat. After venturing into the cavern and looking at the stalactites, commonly known as icicles, and speculating on their formation, we set out to return to the ship.  Several members of the group, who were eager photographers, took pictures as mementos.

We were soon joined by a group of six or eight orcas, killer whales, who were travelling in the same direction.  They were obviously intrigued by these intruders in their territory and began to swim closer to investigate.  They swam around our boat, both above the water and below, getting closer and closer.  Although they did not appear to be planning to attack us, their attention was extremely disconcerting. Since their normal diet of fish does not include small boats, they would not have attacked us as potential food.  

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However, one or more of them could easily surface under our small boat and overturn it.  Or they could get so close on the surface that the waves they were creating could overturn the boat.  In either event, we would be thrown into the icy Antarctic water.  Even if the crew of the ship had seen our predicament, they likely would not have been able to reach us before we were overcome by hypothermia. This would have been unfortunate, especially for us, ending what had been an extremely interesting and educational trip.  Several countries have established bases for exploration and scientific investigation in Antarctica. We visited the former Russian base, which had been abandoned.

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We were able to get as far south as the Antarctic Circle, Latitude 69° South. On our return voyage to Ushuaia the weather had improved markedly. The sea was calm and we enjoyed being able to sit outside.  The daytime temperatures were about 5^o C, which meant that warm clothing was required.

After flying back to Buenos Aires from Ushuaia, we spent two days looking around Buenos Aires before flying back to Miami. Our scheduled flight from Miami to Toronto was canceled, so we had to wait in the airport for a later flight, which left Miami in the early afternoon. This meant that I arrived in Toronto only 30 minutes before my flight left for Edmonton. My baggage did not make the Edmonton flight. When we arrived in Edmonton the temperature was -40° C and I was dressed for the Buenos Aires temperature of +30° C.  Obviously, I was not prepared for the Edmonton weather.  To get around this problem I managed to borrow a parka, from one of the Air Canada staff, to wear home. When they delivered my baggage the next day, they picked up the parka, and this interesting and educational trip was over.

NEW YORK TO MONTREAL CRUISE

In the fall of 1997, Nora and I went on a short cruise from New York to Montréal. We spent a day looking around New York and then boarded the ship in New York Harbor.

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A view of the New York Harbor at a quiet time, with only one boat in view.  The Statue of Liberty is visible in the background.  

Our first stop was in Hyannis Port, Massachusetts.  We spent a few hours on a bus tour viewing the expensive dwellings here.                                      

A comparatively modest house in the same area was listed for sale.  The asking price was $1,999,000.  I have no idea what the price would be on the Kennedy Compound.

We proceeded on to Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island. An untoward incident occurred here. One of the passengers on our cruise fell off the harbor pier into the water. Fortunately, some of the bystanders pulled her out of the water and she was not injured in any way.  The clothing that she was wearing was soaked but not otherwise damaged.

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The next stop was in Québec city. Here we spent a day visiting some of the downtown points of interest.

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We next proceeded to Montréal where we disembarked. We looked around Montréal for two days.

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We drove north into the Laurentians to view the fall scenery.  The leaves of the maple trees had changed to their fall red color. This provided spectacular scenery.

We then flew back to Edmonton, from Montreal.