Kenya Trip 2023 Travel Journal

Our Kenya trip was born out of side conversations during a few visits with Fr. Joseph when he mentioned he was going to his home in Kenya for the first time after over 10 years in the United States.

Fr. Joseph arranged the places to visit and arranged transportation and accommodations. The trip was an adventure in my opinion. We get to see different kinds of landscape, temperature, people, food, tribes and culture. We got lost a few times and have to ask directions a few times. Our vehicle (a Nissan Urvan) went to areas I never thought it could go, but thanks to the amazing skills of our driver.

Below are the “explorers”; (myself [doing the selfie :=)], Tony and Marites Jones, Isla [missed one week of school, Edward aka Edu [our driver], front row: Francis [missed 2 weeks of school], Beth from Herrin, back row: Mitchelle, and our beloved Fr. Joseph.

Click on the link to get to pictures of each day. Click home to get back to this page.

Feb 25-26: Getting To Nairobi

Feb 27: Day 1 – Nairobi; discuss itinerary, get Shillings

Feb 28: Day 2 – Nairobi National Park, and Bomas of Kenya

Mar 1: Day 3 – Lake Naivasha

Mar 2: Day 4 – Maasai Mara

Mar 3: Day 5 – Visit to Fr. Joseph’s Home Town

Mar 4: Day 6 – Kisumu Museum, Mt. Kit-Mikayi, Dunga Beach along Lake Victoria

Mar 5: Day 7 – St Teresa of the Child Jesus Cathedral in Kibuye, Kisumu, Chepkiit Falls, Meetup with Fr. Walter in Eldoret

Mar 6: Day 8 – Lake Bogoria, travel back to Nairobi

Mar 7: Day 9 – Visit Kibera slum in Nairobi, and to Fr. Joseph’s apartment

Mar 8: Day 10 – Downtown Nairobi, Visit to Mother House of the Little Sisters of St, Joseph

Mar 9; Day 11 – Visit with Rhea, Visit with Sara, Depart Nairobi

Below is a screen shot of our trip:

Feb 25 – Travel to Nairobi

Our Travel to Nairobi, Kenya starts with about a 6+ hours car ride (including Chicago traffic) from DuQuoin, IL to Chicago O’Hare International Airport. We left DuQuoin around 7AM CT and arrived in Chicago with a lunch break at Jollibee along Elston Ave.

We flew British Airways with stopover at Heathrow Airport in London, and after delay in Heathrow landed in Nairobi around 11PM local time on Feb 26th, and got out of the airport after midnight with Fr. Joseph waiting for us at the arrival gate.

Day 1: Feb 27 – Discuss Destinations

1st day was mostly rest due to getting to bed early dawn. late breakfast/lunch at Savelberg Retreat Center in Nairobi, our home for the next couple of days. We discussed what we will be doing in the next few days and the places we are going to go.

After lunch, we visited our Lady of Guadalupe Parish Church in Nairobi. This is where Fr. Joseph celebrates mass every so often. The church is very close in distance to Savelberg Retreat Center.

We visited a nearby mall to get money changed to local currency, bought groceries and water. Went to liquor section of Carrefour market to look for local spirits and accidentally broke a bottle like a kid (..ooopsss!) Gladly, the manager considered it an accident and just wants us to buy something and discovered the Amarula, which is a spirit from the Marula fruit from Africa which the elephants and other animals love to eat.

We had a good time after dinner chatting and drinking the Amarula and another spirit (which the latter we discovered after the bottle was almost empty that it had an expiry date which was July of last 2022, hahaha!).

Feb 28: Day 2 – Nairobi National Park

We went on a safari trip to the Nairobi National Park, right inside Nairobi. You can see the city buildings and landscape in the horizons where the animals lived.

Pictures of animals are in a separate post here.

Outside the park some Maasai people hang around for tourists to have pictures taken to earn a living….

Feb 28: Day 2 – Bomas of Kenya

After the safari at Nairobi National Park, we visited Bomas of Kenya, which we learned about the different tribes of Kenya, had a very delicious dinner, entertained with different music and dances of Kenya.

Pictures of the dances are posted in a separate post titled Dances of Kenya.

Dances of Kenya

Some pictures I took at Bomas of Kenya featuring dances from different tribes of Kenya…

Mar 1: Day 3 – Lake Naivasha

On this day, we are traveling towards the Maasai Mara with a stop at Lake Naivasha. Lake Naivasha is known for a lot of birds and it has islands that are a natural habitat for a lot of wild animals. The lake itself is home to a lot of groups of hippos. We took a boat safari to explore its wonders.

Pictures of the safari is found here.

Francis get to drive for a short while.

After Lake Naivasha, we drove and had lunch at the town of Narok.

After lunch, we drove to our destination for the night, which a parish center in Lemek, but got lost and went the other way (despite directions from locals). We lost 4 hours in the night and it rained along the way, roads were rough and our clothes (loaded at the top of the minivan) got wet. We got to our destination around 11PM and we were advised that we will be leaving early at dawn by 5:30AM to leave for Maasai Mara, phew!

Lake Naivasha Boat Safari

We took a boat safari in Lake Naivasha and below are some of the pictures of kids fishing in the lake, birds, lots of hippo groups (even saw one out of the water), and other animals…

Nairobi National Park Safari

a few of the animals we’ve seen during this safari…

Mar 2: Day 4 – Maasai Mara

We left early dawn for Maasai Mara and rode on a Land Cruiser safari vehicle. Kids were still asleep as we were driving in rough terrain.

Our host for the night before and during the Safari was Fr. Francis. and we had lunch at the Fairmont Safari Club.

Pictures of some of the creatures we saw of Maasai Mara are posted here.

We left for the afternoon and head to Kilgoris.