More of the Mountain

A few days before Bud's parents left Kitale, we took the day and went up Mt. Elgon. It is about a 45 minute drive... 30 minutes if you are with Bud. He is a good driver though, I have to say.

Anywho.

We don't go often to Mt. Elgon but I love it when we do. It's a different atmosphere up there. There's a national park that you pay around $30 U.S. dollars to get into for the day. It's not that popular, but come to find out, it's more popular than I thought. There's a certain time of year that elephants come trekking through. Half of Mt. Elgon is Uganda and the other half is Kenya. So sometimes the elephants go to the other side and right now they are on our side. We didn'tsee any, but we sure saw their footprints and poop. There are four caves the you can hike up to and go inside. Then you can drive around seeing cape buffalo, birds, monkeys, deer like things (I need to brush up on my African animals!), big furry creatures that look like over sized moles, very rare sightings of leopards, and then elephants. I might be leaving out some, who knows.

It's a beautiful place though. There are some plateau's you can drive to or hike to that overlook Kitale and some other valleys.

So we loaded up in the land cruiser. Nene, Poppa, Bud, Elisha, Claire, Ian, Caleb, and me. We packed lunch and ate on the way. (we were to eat on the mountain but of course there were delays). We drove around several hours, enjoying the beautiful scenery and finding animals. We'd get out every so often and hike up somewhere. Our kiddos did so great. We plan to go back and camp. They have a place to do so.

Some pretty big deer looking thing

Bud and I with his parents and our children

Beautiful Claire

Monkey! There were a lot but there were hard to get snaps of.

Our fearless leader tracking the elephants by their... um... yeah... ewww

Our "Kenyan sons" Ian and Caleb (who are living in our guesthouse)

Inside one of the caves

Me and my girl

Poppa and Nene coming down into a cave, they were AWESOME at hiking around

The end!

Oh wait, but a few days later Bud went searching on the internet about Mt. Elgon and found A LOT. Including this youtube video.... (glad I saw this AFTER we went! ha! But it wont keep me from going back)