RUPI MANGAT: Mystical Malu

Life can’t get any better than this! I’m soaking my feet in the hot spring flowing into the plunge pool heated naturally in the middle of a cedar forest. Tall, fat fig trees with thick roots surround the pool and I’m in no hurry to go anywhere, especially after the two-kilometre walk to burn off calories from the big healthy breakfast earlier.

Suddenly, Charles Wahome, the naturalist at Malu Lodge, exclaims, “Look, the leopard has been here this morning!”

That’s enough to end spa-time as I look over the pool to see the leopard’s pawprints spread on the wet earth where she came for a drink. We trail her prints through the trees where she’s left more evidence of her presence – a bit of a dikdik’s backbone with some blood and flesh still on it.

“We have a few leopards in the forest,” continues Wahome. I heard the leopard at night, while sleeping in my luxurious bed as the cat hunted in the darkness.

Later, we walk through the cedar forest to reach the top of the escarpment. The cedar trees are a century old – they have thick girths with flaking barks, needle-like leaves and tiny seeds.

Other trees like the Olea africana, Schrebera alata and Euclea divinorum, compete for space with the cedars. It is a busy forest with flitting butterflies on flowering shrubs or perching on the wet earth for some salty nourishment.

A string of white caterpillars march on the forest floor, each holding on to the next to reach the shrubs, while perched on a cedar is a gorgeous Narina’s trogon.

The forest is silent save for the birds and bees hovering by the flowering bushes. Then suddenly, the particular sound of a bird catches the ears of Luca Borghesio, a forest biologist and ornithologist. He dives into the thickets.

Turning back, we take the same steep path downwards, then Borghesio jumps back into the bush at exactly the same spot and calls out excited, “Wahome, come here quick!”

Minutes later, the men reappear. They have seen the Sharpe’s starling – the bird that Borghesio heard the first time. It’s a rare bird to see because it perches on tall trees and one can go by it without noticing it.

Walking back through the forest on our way to a late lunch, Borghesio tells us about the forest.

STUNNING VIEWS

“A hundred years ago, this must have been more open ground because the trees are relatively young except for the cedar. Cedar trees have very tiny seeds that need fire or the gut of a bird to digest and spit it out to germinate.

Forests are dynamic ecosystems, so the next 100 years may see different forest trees coming up like the podo, olive and fig while the existing cedar may grow taller,” he explains.   

On the highland plains, we are treated to stunning views of the massif of Eburru and Lake Naivasha on the floor of the Rift. After another hearty lunch under the makuti-thatched restaurant that shows off the beautiful forested hill – the only one that has a cedar forest – we’re off to search for a grassland bird that’s one of the most threatened in Kenya: Sharpe’s longclaw. It is a bird with a “only found in Kenya” tag.

Also on the plains, we see donkeys that have mated with common zebras to produce offspring that has part zebra stripes, and part donkey colours. They are called ‘zonkeys’.

The herders we find there appear to know about Sharpe’s longclaw. They tell us that it is hunted by the Luhya working around this area to entice their women. But there’s no bird to be seen in the grasses. Instead, we’re treated to large herds of zebras, some zonkeys, eland and comical warthogs.

The next morning, excited kids run off to milk cows after breakfast. Joining in, I’m invited to milk a cow – a first for me. It’s quite an experience!

Later, strolling around one of the many walking trails at Malu, we climb the stairs to Tree House on the banks of River Malewa flowing from the Aberdares and into Lake Naivasha. The hippos are further down the bend. By the banks of Mahindu River, a quaint old cottage that once belonged to a woman who kept a lion for company, is now a holiday home.