Walking in the footsteps of our ancestors

On the map, the distance between Loyiangalani and Koobi Fora along Lake Turkana seems insignificant.

In reality, it’s bone shattering. Large barren earth-swept plains stretch into the distance and trains of camels follow well-trodden paths laid out like endless ropes.

Unbelievably it has been a good year, with rains until a few months ago.

Quilt-like patches of green grass break the monotony of the flat plains. In the green patches, the camels and goats graze while men, and sometimes children, stand guard like stick figurines in the distance.

The continuous plateau, though we’re driving alongside it, hides the lake. In this midst of this bareness a lone sign points to Sibiloi.

It’s 66 kilometres to the Karsa gate at Sibiloi National Park and 110 to Koobi Fora.

Our spirits lift – that translates to about a three-hour drive to the gate.

A decade ago, we crossed the lake in a rubber dingy from Kalokal on the western shores past the active volcanic Central Island dotted with its three lakes and landed on the shores of Koobi Fora at Alia Bay.

Koobi Fora is from the Gabbra word for the hardy commiphora bush.

Searing heat

In Koobi Fora, one of the richest fossil sites on earth, animal bones and vegetation have fossilised in the stratified sediments of the Great Rift Valley.

Because of its four-million-year-old history, it has been dubbed the cradle of mankind.

The fossils found here include those of Autralopithecus, Homo habilis, Homo erectus and the 3.5-million-year old skull of Kenyanthropus platyopus (the flat-faced man of Kenya) discovered by Dr Maeve Leakey.

At the time of the discovery the lake was much larger and the area a forest.

We follow the track to the shores of the KWS headquarters by Alia Bay and see zebra, ostrich, kongoni and a myriad of wading birds in the wetlands around the lake.

In the searing heat we backtrack to the petrified cedar forest on the high escarpment overlooking the wide expanse of the park.

Gigantic logs of cedar lie on the ground as they have for millennia, fossilised into stone.

A butterfly flits on the rocks, a deep purple flower grows out of the rock cervix.