After what was very much a bittersweet and somewhat surreal month away over Christmas and New Year we finally got back home a couple of days before my birthday... which we had BOTH forgotten about! In fact, it wasn't until the day before, whilst Chris was organising a couple of farm visits that we realised what the date was and in an instant decided to invite our neighbours over for drinks to celebrate. We do have a really lovely, yet small community on Kenana Farm and social events can often be the only time to get out and catch up, or in our case actually meet some neighbours. This was to be our first hosting!
So 'Herbie', as I was referred to ALL day (imagine crossed eyes emoji here), spent the morning food shopping and the entire afternoon cooking various vegetarian curries with literally five minutes to spare before our guests arrived. Chris had two jobs; to collect the glasses we'd planned to borrow from the Kembu Bar and cook the rice... he had an unfortunate accident with the glasses (once I'd washed them all, obviously) dropping [smashing] half of them on the veranda and cooked enough rice for forty - we had 6 guests! A tactful way of ensuring that when we host again his 'Job List' will be reduced to zero! Despite the birthday get together being very much a last minute idea, we had the most enjoyable, chilled evening, filled with lots of laughter and chat. AND as it happens we have really great neighbours, whose dogs all followed them here.
Humans: 8 Dogs: 5
Celebrations aside, there have been two other events that have stood out for us this month which I wanted to share...
Loons
We finally spotted our first Google Loon this week. I wasn't aware of them until we moved here. They are solar-powered, helium filled, balloons about the size of a football pitch which float about 20km above us providing us with mobile internet, a little like mobile phone towers in the sky I suppose. Being solar-powered they don't run 24/7, instead usually work from 6am until 9pm when their batteries run out. You can actually see their paths indicated by the yellow spots and red trails on flightradar24.
At the moment there are 35 Loons floating above Kenya providing those using the Telkom Kenya ISP in remote areas with coverage. Unfortunately, the Loon Project has been terminated this week, apparently owing to financial issues, so it seems by the end of March they will no longer be floating above us.
Hornbill hostage
The birds around Kenana Cottage are generally speaking becoming more and more tame and appear to have learned when to expect any breakfast leftovers. At around 10 every morning we can usually see between 5 and 10 partying around the birdbath.
However, things have got a little out of hand. Whilst I love watching them, feeding them and photographing them I’m not courageous enough to touch them and they’ve started wandering into the HOUSE! Once indoors they nibble on avocado or banana from the fruit bowl (now always covered) and then aren't able to find their way back out. Chris, who thinks he’s an Attenborough in the making (he saved a cow earlier this week) has the ability to scoop them up and release them outside.
One morning last week however, this scenario occurred three times and each time I’d have to ask for his help in getting them out and I sensed it [I] was starting to become just a little bit annoying. If I'm honest, I do have toast for breakfast purely to create some breadcrumbs so he’s probably right... it IS becoming a bit of an obsession.
An hour later I was outside and a hornbill flew by and perched on the veranda ledge. My first hornbill... I was sooo excited, I squealed for Chris to come out and rushed inside to grab my camera - a Crowned Hornbill. They are about half a metre in size with a beastly looking bill and apparently the only bird with eyelashes. I managed to get several shots of it as it didn't seem to be particularly intimidated by me, in fact the reverse, I started getting slightly unnerved by it! Minutes later whilst in the bedroom I heard huge crashing sounds - it was trying to fly inside. I was petrified! I quickly shut all the doors and windows. I assumed he could see his reflection and thought it was a possible mate, so I shut all the curtains too. With a pounding heart, I lay on the bed and yet could still hear the high pitched piping call and thuds on the windows. It was actually flying into one window after another, from bedroom to bathroom to dressing room. We remained hostage in the house for a couple of hours until he eventually flew off! Having done a little research on them, it transpires they do see a reflection in windows - which they are known to smash - but they attack because they see them as an enemy rather than a potential partner!
Rather belatedly, we wish everyone all the very best for 2021!
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