Hippo's are dangerous

I love this sign, kenyans have a knack of stating the obvious, especially when it comes to sign writing. I came across this sign while at a campsite on the shore of Lake Baringo. There was another sign as you drive into the camp suggesting to visitors that camping in this particular place might also be dangerous and you do it at your own risk. It seemed a bit over the top but you could imagine that if a tourist did actually get attacked by a hippo one of the locals would rush up and say 'you were warned!' Since I wasn't camping as such, it didn't worry me unduly. Myself and my husband were staying in a banda, not a tent, although our chef had pitched his tent next to our banda and he didn't seem too concerned either.

While we were waiting for dinner me and Ken strolled down to the lake which was in fact only about 20 metres away. The scene was just perfect, water gently lapping against the sandy earth, birds singing in the background and hopping around picking up insects. The sky was turning a golden orange and pale pink as the sun was setting. Then right in front of the lake was this sign urging us to be cautious and stating the obvious, that both hippo's and crocodiles are dangerous, It didn't say that hippo's were likely to pop up right in front of you without warning, which is exactly what happened, suddenly two hippo heads appeared out of the water so gently they barely caused a ripple, they were less than 5 metres from where we stood!

My first reaction after the initial surprise was to take a photo, I always have my camera with me. They were so relaxed and didn't look in the least bit threatening. Hippo's are generally only dangerous if they feel their babies are threatened, we found this out the following day when we were out in a boat and accidentally got a little too close to a mother and baby, she didn't like it one bit. She actually chased us away, making really load noises at us and leaving us in no doubt that she meant business. You tend not to hang around when faced with two tonnes of angry hippo, they can overturn a small boat no problem. Or they might attack you if you surprise them while they are grazing. They come out of the lake each night to graze on the land retuning to the lake at dawn. We could hear them communicating to each other outside our banda, I wasn't about to pop outside in the dead of the night and surprise them anyway!

We never got to see any crocodiles, dangerous or otherwise. My lasting impression of Lake Baringo was one of tranquility, so relaxing and calm, a perfect place to write a book. The reason for this is that there is not much to do, no activity or distractions.