Night Sounds of Africa

I've long loved the night sounds of Kansas, the crickets, the cicadas, the wind in the trees. Imagine my delight discovering a new world of night sounds in Kenya. Surrounded by mosquito netting in my bed at Samburu Game Lodge, I could hear the elephants splashing in the river as they trumpeted in the night. Flashlights glinted below my room as the natives patrolled, keeping the wild animals away from our sleeping quarters.

At Mara Simba Lodge in the Masai Mara Game Reserve, again, my room was just yards from the river. This particular evening, the night sounds came from hippos roaring and the rumblings of a Kenyan thunderstorm headed our way. The windows had to be kept shut to keep out the pesky spider monkeys but the hippos were close enough to hear all through the night.

A sandbar on the opposite side of the river was the focus from the open-air Mara Simba lounge where we drank Tusk beer while watching a croc come out of the river and lie down next to a mama hippo with her baby. I expected one or the other to growl or move away, but they rested side-by-side on the sandbar. The air was filled with the Swahili-accented voices of two Masai teens as they sang folk songs. Nothing beats listening to Kumbaya in the night air of Kenya.

And, like the title of a song they sang, I admit, "I Love Ya, Kenya".