Kakamega Forest:

On September 10, we had a day off. Nancy and Meg chose to visit the nearby Kakamega Forest which is supposed to be very rich in birds especially a certain kind of Turco and butterflies. Later I learned that 40% of Kenyan butterflies are in the Kakamega Forest. We took a Matatu, local minibus, on which you negotiate fares with the conductor. Once when they were not regulated there were many accidents, now they follow the government ordinances like keeping the maximum capacity or providing with seatbelts, sort of. We were told to put them on probably for police check, but nothing happened. It was a wonderful 20 minutes ride with local people with many babies.

The forest is a tropical rain forest full of very thick tall trees. We were ready to do bird watching, but all that we could do was to hear chirpings but no sight of birds because of dense foliage. Quickly we gave up on the bird watching idea and decided to enjoy the walk through cool forests. We saw Black Colubus monkeys up on a tree watching us, also some Blue Monkeys among dark thick foliage. Later we learned the large ground birds we spotted afar were Helmeted Guinea Hens.