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On our way to Nairobi and just outside Amboseli park, Alex took us to a Maasai village. Some of the villagers were out with the cattle but there were still a few there to meet us, they all seemed pleased to see us and all were eager to shake our hands.
The village basically consists of half a dozen or so small huts, the cattle that were out and some goats. It was in a very hot and dry part of the bush, life here is tough, I couldn’t even begin or want to imagine what it would be like living here.
I didn’t feel comfortable taking pictures of the people that lived here, Alex had assured us that the Maasai were fine with it, and obviously we would pay them, but it just didn’t feel right. After all, what right did I have to intrude on these people’s lives? So I only took a few pictures.
Alex had arranged for us to go inside a house with one of the families. This would be interesting...
The passage-way into the living area was small and narrow and even I had to duck down! I was invited to sit down, but where? I couldn’t see a thing. It was pitch black and it took a while for my eyes to adjust. There is no electricity here. As my eyes were adjusting to the darkness and I perched myself on the end of their bed the next thing to hit me was the noise from all the flies buzzing around, it sounded like there were hundreds of them. The house basically consisted of a sleeping area for the family, which was two children and their parents. There was a small area on the floor for cooking and there were a couple of seats around the cooking area. The main structure of the house is a framework made of timber poles fixed into the ground and interwoven with smaller branches, which are then plastered with a mixture of mud and dung.
Next time you are thinking about your carbon footprint and how small it may or may not be, think about how the Maasai live...
I left stunned by how these people live. They farm in the desert and scrubland, don’t have running water, there are no shops, the children have to walk to a school that is a few miles away.
As we drove away I sat in silence for a while. I just could not get over how these people lived, there was hardly anything here for them to live off, yet they had survived this way for generations.
As I pondered their existence I took a sip from my bottle of water that had been kept cool in the fridge. This was a cold bottle of water - something not even possible in the village that I had just left behind.

Click here to see the short video of a feeding Badger. I have been putting a small amount of food out (peanuts, they love them) to get them used to coming to an area where I plan to photograph them. I am using a camera trap record any activity. Hopefully I can get a rough idea of the number of individuals in the group, but so far it's only been this one guy that has turned up.
I've only had the camera running for four nights and now it's broken, so I have to send it back to get it replaced. Bit of a pain, but hopefully I will have some more footage in a few days.

There is no better way to spend a sunset. A glass of wine, friends and the snow capped peak of Kilimanjaro being bathed in the last rays of the evening ilght.























And how amazing are the sunsets? This was a special moment and I will remember this sunset for the rest of my life. I have to say a massive thanks to Alex our guide. The safari was brilliant and it was great having a guide who was prepared to stop wherever I wanted for as long as I wanted. I also found it amusing that whilst we were still out enjoying these amazing sunsets, most other safari guides had taken their clients back.

Some mornings it was nice just to go down to the beach and watch the sunrise. I didn't always take the camera as it was better just to sit there and just watch.

I will have pictures and more info soon, but here are some of my first thoughts after reaching the wonderful country that I can't wait to get back to.

From corruption and crime, to beautiful scenery and wildlife, Kenya has it all. My fleeting visit to this land has shown me some of its highs and lows.
My first introduction to Kenya was the journey from Mombasa to the hotel in Diani, It frightened the life out of me. You see images of third world countries on TV all of the time, but it doesn’t really hit home until you are there, in the middle of the hustle and bustle and the people’s daily routine for survival. The first thing that hits me is the litter; it’s just thrown to the ground, used tyres, plastic bottles and paper. In places it was everywhere, outside buildings and just off the pavement. Then in other places it was tidy.
The traffic is heavy too. What I was to learn could have been a 60 minute journey was to take almost two and half hours, in a sticky and very hot mini bus. Every time we stopped there was somebody trying to sell something to us through the window, bottles of water, newspapers or souvenirs. This was people trying to make a living at the most desperate level and i was afraid to make eye contact with them. The standard of driving was an eye opener too. Overtaking with traffic coming at you seemed perfectly normal, with a beep of the horn to let the car on the left know you were passing. Oh, and all this going on whilst the car we were passing was overtaking a cyclist! I quickly wondered if people actually took a driving test here as nobody seemed to use their mirrors. On a couple of occasions our driver had to swerve as another car pulled out in front of us with no warning. This was scary stuff! I would later learn that it was quite easy to ‘buy’ a driving license in Kenya, which I think explains the general standard of driving. This was becoming more of a culture shock with every passing minute.
In amongst the dirty buildings and the people struggling through each day there were (what seemed to me) out of place images of the western world. There were bill boards advertising large screen TV’s, the (almost) latest mobile phones along with adverts for Orange. Apparently there were people nestled away somewhere in the city that could afford luxuries.
We were heading to a ferry which would take us from Mombasa to Diani. When finally at the ferry I watched as cars barged their way onto it and people swarmed to the upper decks like ants. Our turn to board arrived and it was now evident that our bus had lost first gear as it struggled up the ramp with the smell of a protesting clutch wafting through the window. We crossed and the bus barely made up the ramp as the clutch struggled with its load of holiday makers. God what had I let myself in for?
On the other side we still had the now familiar litter in places and the bad driving, but now we had cattle walking the roads and children working on small building sites. Buildings had no glass in the windows, people just seemed to sit outside doing nothing but stare as we drove past. But eventually there were signs of civilization, a shopping centre with glass in the windows! In places the road was lined with trees with beautiful orange and red flowers, this was more like it. Now tired and hot we arrived at the hotel. It was lovely. The staff were friendly, the grounds were clean and picturesque, there were monkeys running around and the pool looked great! I had never had such an eye opening journey from an airport to a hotel.

Check out Scraggy!!! She has gone from a bald battery hen to the happy proud owner of a new beautiful coat of feathers. If it hadn't have been for her slightly deformed beak I wouldn't have believed it was the same chicken. It certainly shows what a nice environment can do for these chickens. Well done John.

These were taken at Durdle Door on the Dorset coast. I don't normally do landscape, hence the reason they are not very good, but thought I'd have a play on the coast during the Christmas break. The weather was rubbish, very foggy. The picture of the 'Door' was so dull (the fog was up to the Door) I decided to make black and white. There was nothing else to point the camera at, so I thought I would play with the waves. Roll on Kenya...

I'm well chuffed that I have had this guy published in the reader gallery of the January edition of Outdoor Photography.

Had a stroll around my badger and fox site this morning to try and get an idea of what they have been up to in this cold and snowy weather. The great thing about the snow is that it is very easy to see what all the animals have been up to with the tracks they leave behind.

As I walked across the fields the first thing I noticed was how many rabbits had been out, which is good for Mr Fox. As I approach the field where the sett is there are two badger tracks coming into the field I am in, one through the gate, the other came in through a hedge. This field is usually a favourite for digging worms, but no signs of worm digging here since the snow. Once in the area of the sett it looks like only two badgers have been active from the entrances in this area. There are plenty more rabbit tracks and some fox tracks from two foxes. Into the next field where there are some more entrances to the sett and again more rabbit tracks. A close examination of a sett entrance that gets used heavily during the spring and summer and there are some lovely badger prints. They leave the entrance and go straight to another entrance which is only four feet away. I reckon he came out, didn’t like the cold and went straight back in. Can’t blame him really! This field is also a favourite site for worms, but again, no signs of digging since the snow. It’s tough being a badger in winter. I also spot a fox track that goes into a badger hole which has been used by the badgers this year.

More exploration of the field shows that the fox has been working this field a lot. I follow a track that I picked up on the far side of the field; it crosses a rabbit track a couple of times. The fox must have picked up the scent of the rabbit when it crossed the track. Sure enough I follow the track to the middle of the field where it meets the rabbit track again and there is a large patch of flattened snow and a small patch of blood here. Dinner is served.

The abundance of rabbits here sustains the foxes nicely, proving that this is a rich and healthy habitat. This has been made easier to see from the lovely snow that brings so much chaos to our country. It can go now though, because I’ve had enough of it after only two days!

Meet Scraggy.

She lived on a farm that had to close, so she was to be killed. As you can see, she was not kept in the best of conditions. Thankfully a friend of mine, John, decided to rescue her and her sisters that were on the farm.
She moved in with some chickens that John already had, but sadly they picked on her. But it’s not all bad, she now has free run of a large part of the garden and her own shed to spend the nights safely in.
She was enjoying some warm morning sun when this was taken last Sunday. I gave her a few grapes as payment for posing for me. For a bird that had such a rough start to life she has a great character.
So this is just a little reminder for the next time you are in the supermarket buying eggs, spend a little more and buy the ‘happy’ kind. A happy chicken produces much better tasting eggs.