The end of the road folks! Isiolo, itself a small dusty town, had one friendly hotel in the place. The Boman Hotel is lovely. We met a variety of folks there, including one guy from the UK and another from the states who said it cost too much -- they liked to stay for just $2.00 a night......please that has got to be one dark hole for $2.00 a night. The Boman's hot running water, lovely electricity and delicious food were the last we were to see of that kind of luxury for days upon days. The above picture is actually several hours drive after Isiolo. Nonetheless, Isiolo sticks in my mind as the end of running water and electricity on the trip. Once we left the tarmac--for all of you Americans, that's blacktop pavement--we got to enjoy the absolute gruelling "corrugated roads". It's a gravel/sand road, hard as rocks, and can jiggle the junk right out of you. Ahhh, but wait till it rains--thankfully for us it did not rain ON THE ACTUAL desert while we were there. We covered miles and miles of scrub savannahs, sand and more sand. Talk about a Kenya I had never seen before. We did see one giraffe and several ostrich and gazelle and dik diks but honey--talk about desolate, hot and dusty. I could not see how anything could actually live here. This journey taught me that when people say there is drought, it means there is NO WATER.
In this picture, you can see there was also no "telephone access" except if you were willing to climb the telephone tree and make a call back to your friends and family. Needless to say, adorned in my skirt, I did not make the telephone call. That's Steven, our guide and driver through the desert up there. Kenyans love their phones!!! They actually go through withdrawal passing through the Golbe desert. Kenyans say over and over again, "do we have access yet?" Sorry folks, this part of the journey requires you to hang up! This was the only vehicle we saw all this day, and it was actually the last running vehicle we saw for the next 2 days (and that includes our own vehicle). Wait till you see what fun we had in Elam---Elam holds connotations for us on the trip that we can never ever forget. Elam--ask Josie, Sherri, Sam, Tom or I about it. Immediately a flood of emotions engulf us -- we grin, grimmace, hollar, sniff the air, cry out, enthusiastically count our blessings, and laugh idiotically all in the amount of time it takes to say "Elam".
Nomad's Hotel was actually before the telephone tree. I'm going backwards at this point! Last stop for coke for the next 4 days folks! This little restaurant (yes Kenyans call restaurants hotels) was after the pavement ended but before the telephone tree. We had Pepsi this day, served in a true Manyatta. Follows are more photos of that lovely little stop. We were waited on by the most gregarious of men who washed our hands, brought us gizzards and chapatis, and served me my only Pepsi on the trip!!!!
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| Inside the Manyatta - yes we sat on beds! |
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| Warm water to wash our hands before eating chapatis, gizzards and Pepsi! |
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| Delightfully served tea, pepsi in a Manyatta--if you don't know what a manyatta is--those pictures are coming! |
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| Sherri and Sam Wilson -- enjoying our first day of our journey from Isiola to Ngurunit (we are still quite refreshed and ready for anything here). Ha! Looking back, at the time, we thought we had done quite a journey so far. WE KNEW NOTHING! I repeat "think Schultz from Hogan's Hero" when you say it. WE KNEW NOTHING!!! |
Nomad's Hotel was actually before the telephone tree. I'm going backwards at this point! Last stop for coke for the next 4 days folks! This little restaurant (yes Kenyans call restaurants hotels) was after the pavement ended but before the telephone tree. We had Pepsi this day, served in a true Manyatta. Follows are more photos of that lovely little stop. We were waited on by the most gregarious of men who washed our hands, brought us gizzards and chapatis, and served me my only Pepsi on the trip!!!!
