Pushing through the wall was the theme of these last two days. A wall of intense heat, sweat, blisters, unrelenting rocky hillsides to climb and descend, rivers to ford and increasingly intense body odour from the safari team walking with me. For those who know me well, you will appreciate how difficult that last one was to handle!
Sometimes I almost wish my sense of smell were not so sharp, but then I would also have missed the sudden puffs of wild flower aroma, the mouth-watering smell of grilled mutton from the villages, the crisp scent of flowing mountain water and the intriguing perfume of hillside shrubs.
My safari team consists of one Kikuyu guide who knows everything about flora and fauna, one Maasai guard who knows how to find invisible paths and keep wild animals at bay, and one half-Maasai half-Kikuyu chef who gets up first and goes to bed last while ensuring everyone is fed. They all carry large rucksacks, with tents, food, utensils and maybe a single change of clothing – or just what they are wearing, as the chef and the Maasai guard have not changed since we started walking. The Maasai has a distinct advantage though: he does not sweat! This in-built genetic advantage of his makes him the most pleasant person to follow on the trail, while the knowledgable guide is the most problematic to walk close to. A shame of course, as he interprets the landscape so well for me, but his odour is very hard to ignore.
But while they may have some body odour issues, which they seem oblivious to, I have a different problem brought on by this heat and 6-7 hours of walking every day: heat rash! I have never had it before, but once the madly itchy scaly rash on my right arm also spread to my left arm and down my legs, I knew it was not just an allergic reaction to a plant, or some such, that I might have touched. I have tried aloe vera straight from a freshly cut leaf, papaw ointment courtesy of Mandy Lawler, fresh river water, sunshine, self-hypnosis on my immune system, and then I ran out of ideas… other than to get out of this heat and stop the gruelling daily marches!
I don’t quite know what I was imagining a walking safari would entail, but had I given it some more thought before embarking on one, I might have brought proper walking shoes instead of old trainers that are a bit too small, some long-sleeved tops that could keep the worst sun off me, and maybe even another pair of socks, as I am quite convinced that the pair I have worn for the last four days will never wash back to white again!
On the other hand, counting my blessings, I am grateful for the tube of Pringles I otherwise never eat but picked up in a supermarket in Nairobi: they have been topping up my drained salt levels from all the sweating. I am also very happy with the portable battery pack that I use to recharge my iPhone and data modem-router, which get me online when there is network coverage. Reporting on my adventures and sharing my ponderings with you feels almost as important as salt for re-establishing my well-being after another intense day in the sun. I am also immensely grateful for the hat that Mel Switters sent to Lamu for me, as that has probably saved me from sun stroke a couple of times already. It also helped people to recognise me the second time in Lamu, as I suppose it can be difficult for the locals to tell the difference between mzungu tourists who look very similar to them. I became the “doctor with the hat”.
In these Maasai hills, I am the only mzungu I have laid eyes on, and the open-mouthed stares from the children (and some adults too!) confirm that Caucasians are not often seen in these parts. Sometimes I find it hard to deal with, when locals sit down within a few metres of me, and just STARE! Maybe that is what the first Africans who came to Europe were also subjected to… I try to be polite and just let them do it, but once we have set up camp in the late afternoon, I tend to retreat to my tent to find refuge from the stares, and to cool down from the glare of the sun.
I now long to return to a climate that feels familiar, so my feet can heal and my skin’s fire can cool down. That might seem odd to those of you in places where it is raining, snowing and otherwise anything but “too hot”, but Africa is harsh for those not born here. The locals have sometimes asked me if they would get “snow burn” if they went to where I come from, because my white skin gets sun burnt, so it’s easy enough to grasp the logic they are applying to their black skin… “No,” I tell them, “but you might need an extra jacket or two!”
Longing now for that extra-jacket-wearing weather myself, I may already be eating my own words by the time I land in cold and wet Heathrow!
