An adventure to Mombasa!

Having hardly slept due to the adventure ahead of us, me and Jo walked bleary eyed to Best Bar where we would be meeting up with the teachers and pupils from Shimoni Base Academy. After waiting an hour and half for everyone to arrive and fill up the bus twice over, we were off. Our 4 year old hot water bottles kept us lovely and warm in the 30 degree heat and the journey over the bumpy dirt track, along the main road that took us to the Ferry in Likoni was a long one but with the children singing in the back and hearing the excitement in their voices made it fly by.

-Jo and Kate enjoying the journey-

When we reached the Ferry port in Likoni the excitement levels rose as some of the children had never seen the ferry before let alone been on it. We headed straight for Fort Jesus once we had crossed where we all had ice creams and then went inside, we had quick tour around the fort which the kids seemed to enjoy and the guide was good at engaging them. Fort Jesus is in the shape of a human and on the tour we walked through the hands, arms up to the head and then down to the feet. There were many photo opportunities sitting on the canons and the teachers enjoyed this just as much as the children.

The day was heating up and the children were tiring but next on the day’s schedule was Haller Park. They couldn’t wait to see the animals and walking through the park under the shade of the trees made the mid-day heat a lot more bearable. We saw the crocodiles first, there was about 20 in total some cooling off in the water and others sunbathing on the edge with their mouths open. There were a couple of yawning hippopotamuses swimming in the lake and then we moved onto the buffalo looking at us hungrily in the hope we would feed them. This was not possible but it was feeding time in the giraffe enclosure, everyone grabbed a handful of giraffe pellets and nervously stepped forward for the giraffes to wind their long tongues around the food. There was lots of laughing and hesitation but the giraffes had a very good feed.

-Giraffe feeding time!-

By 3pm we were feeling very hungry and the biryani couldn’t have come sooner. After satisfying our hunger me and Jo thought we were heading home only to find ourselves at the beach for more ice creams and camel rides. Madame Hadia took a few of the kids on and there were yelps as the camel quickly stood up.

Heading home everyone was feeling very sleepy after a thrilling day in Mombasa but the journey home was still full of song even a few boom-chicka-booms were thrown in. It was a great day and we had as much fun as the kids.

An adventure to Mombasa!