Manor with a tall story

Giraffes dining with guests at the Giraffe Manor in Karen. PHOTO/FILE

What you need to know:

  • Fancy dining with and making eye contact with the tallest animal in the world? Then this is just the experience for you. By Rupi Mangat

We are looking at the iconic Ngong Hills from a sun-lit room in Nairobi’s suburban Langata, when tall necks come into view.

It is midday and the giraffes are taking it easy. On most mornings, they join guests for breakfast at Giraffe Manor – literally poking their heads through the window for a bite.

It’s a unique moment for no other house in the world can boast of ‘dining’ with giraffes – especially a sub-species that is so rare. The story of the Rothschild giraffe and Giraffe Manor is so entwined that you can’t speak of one without the other.

The Rothschild giraffe was named after Sir Walter Rothschild, the first zoologist to officially describe it following an expedition to Kenya in early 1900.

Until the 1970s, herds of the Rothschild were common in western Kenya, at a place called Soy. However the land was earmarked for small-scale agriculture, which meant that the giraffes would have little chance of survival in the wild.

That’s where Betty Leslie-Melville an American conservationist, came in. Betty and her husband Jock had bought a manor, built in the 1930s, to live in. It had a big garden which bordered the Nairobi National Park.

Sometimes giraffes from the park would come into the garden to browse on the acacias. At a dinner party hosted by the Leslie-Melvilles, the talk was centered on Rothschild giraffes and their uncertain future in the wild.

Betty apparently stated, “why not bring the giraffes to our garden?” And that was the start of one of the most successful conservation projects in Kenya and one that gave the manor its name.

Endangered animals

A breeding herd was brought to Nairobi, and the first of the tall beauties was named Daisy, who also became known as Daisy Rothschild.

Betty went on to pen a book titled Raising Daisy and both she and Jock started the African Fund for Endangered Wildlife ( another way of saying “a few”) to fundraise for one of the rarest giraffes on the planet.

Only a thousand survive in the wild – that’s both in Kenya and Uganda. (In Uganda they are only found in Murchison National Park).

AFEW also opened the Giraffe Centre, where Kenyan children and tourists could come to learn more about giraffes and have a unique experience making eye contact with the giraffes.

It is refreshing to wander around the manor. Apart from making eye-contact with the giraffes from the upper floor, the giraffes can easily look through the upper floor window.

It’s almost like the Manor is built for the giraffes for a huge front door opens to the enormous foyer. I’m quite sure that a young giraffe can squeeze through it.

Upstairs the ensuite rooms have been modernised to suit contemporary tastes, and bedrooms facing the iconic Ngong Hills boast private balconies to enjoy the view or pat a giraffe on the head.

Treats for the tall ones

Around the time that the manor was being built, Karen Blixen of the Out of Africa fame was leaving Kenya after a spell of disasters with her coffee farm and the death of her lover, Denis Finch Hatton, in a tragic plane crash.

Some of her collection of period furniture graces the manor today. Having wandered around the iconic manor with a tall story, I’m surprised to see a ‘mini manor’ standing by the original. It is built exactly the same but on a smaller scale.

Outside the giraffes are warming up together with a family of warthogs. It’s comical to watch them bend at the knee to graze the lawn (they also keep the grass manicured) because their necks aren’t long enough to reach the ground.

Tourists and school groups begin to arrive at the Giraffe Centre at the end of the garden and the giraffes know it is time for treats.

With languid long strides, they make for the circular centre from where those standing on the raised deck have their first experience of eye-to-eye contact with the world’s tallest mammal, and one that is listed as endangered because there are fewer than 700 in the wild.