It is impossible to stop falling in love with this landscape. Hundreds of safaris later, I still find myself entranced and fascinated as I drive along the Mara’s dusty trails. There is something so appealing about its endless grassy plains and massive skies.
The fresh air and the joyful sunlight bring about a sense of calm, with all the worries of the world fading away as you focus just on the present. Your mind is filled with thoughts of the wilderness: Will I see a rhino today? Did the cheetah brothers manage to make a kill? Is it going to rain this evening?
Time in the Mara shifts perspectives and priorities. Days are not driven by meetings or directives — emails are allowed to sit unanswered for a few days, rush hour traffic is replaced by massive elephant bulls marching down the road.
My addiction to the Mara Triangle is fed by following the lives of the animals that call it home. I love to document their journeys, trials, tribulations, their successes and the ingenious ways they adapt to survive.
We are entering a challenging time for lions across the Mara. The long grasses mean that prey densities have decreased. Lions now need to take greater risks and shift their diets to the resident buffalo herds. Hunting buffalo is dangerous and intimidating, as the five youngsters from the Egyptian Pride found out first-hand. Fortunately, sanity prevailed, and they managed to sprint away to safety.
I am very fortunate to be spending time in the Mara Triangle during a period of such phenomenal male lion dominance. We believe there are as many as 25 big males using this 510 sq km area; a number that must surely place this reserve as one of the greatest lion viewing locations in Africa.
