Adventure to our Adventure
One of our Maasai Mara game drives involved quite a bit of non-animal related adventure. First one of our rear tires came off the rim after hitting a big rock. This is a fairly common occurrence given the vehicles run around with fairly low pressure in the tires for traction.
The guides jumped in as a team and completed the wheel change in less than 5 minutes flat! No real drama, just some good pictures.
Next; however, we received some real “rainy season” adventure, even though this is suppose to be the dry season. We needed to ford a small stream, and two of the vehicles became solidly stuck in the axle deep mud.
Our vehicle was the worst as it was sunk up to both axles in the dead middle of the deepest muck. Eventually it necessitated all of us exiting the vehicle into the mud so they the guides could figure out what to do.
The interesting part was that none of the vehicles had any sort of winch, so the only options were using other non-stuck vehicles to push or pull with a short chain.
Eventually with the help of some other safari vehicles that came along, the guides were able to pull our vehicle out. Unfortunately, it was on the wrong side of the ford and when they tried to get it across to us the stuck it in again.
Mean time we all took shelter under the nearest savanna tree and observed the keystone cop routine, scraping mud off our shoes and pants as best we could.
It was a bit hot and uncomfortable due to the heat and swarms of flies, but all’s well that ends well… to their credit and team work, eventually all vehicles were rescued and we proceeded with our game drive.
When we returned to the Fairmont, staff were waiting for us and gave us styling slippers to wear while they cleaned all our shoes (they did a great job).
So that was our little adventure with an adventure.