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1900

Adventure dispatch 3 of 8, taken from the scribbles in North coast adventurer Kingsley Holgate

Adventure dispatch 3 of 8, taken from the scribbles in North coast adventurer Kingsley Holgate

Date: 2014-10-03
The three 'Journey to the Jade Sea' expedition landy's are piled high and it's with a sense of excitement that we meet old friend William Kimasop, chief conservator for the Lake Bogoria area and veteran of many a Kingsley Holgate adventure. It's a tradition for us to stop for a ceremony at the point where the equator crosses the road north up East Africa's Great Rift Valley. Today is no exception and we use this opportunity to distribute life-saving Mosquito nets and Malaria prevention education to the mum's of the area.

With the equator ceremony over we drop down a narrow red dust track towards beautiful Lake Bogoria, "The tail-gate café has pulled over into the bush on the right overlooking the great rift", crackles Bruce Leslie's voice over the radio.Land Rover tail-gate lunches are an old expedition tradition simply put, down comes the landy tail-gate and you eat whatever you can find in the grub box. Today there is a discussion about bully beef, does it really have donkeys ears in it. No just sheep's goolies says Ross with a grin. A tin of tuna is added to the mix and this early in the journey the bread is still fresh and there are no dodgy tummies. That will be saved for camp fire stews and Imodium and goat. Good humour is part of every expedition.

That night we camp at William Kimasop's secret place high on a lookout point with endless sunset views over the lake and the eastern wall of the Great Rift known here as the Siracho Escarpment. "The water level is at its highest in nearly a hundred years", says William, and the hot water geysers that normally spurt for meters into the sky are now submerged below the surface leaving rings like farts in the bath. Turkana expedition member Lumbaye Lenguru has travelled with us for more than twenty years, he's a delightful little character, who speaks the languages of Kenya's northern frontier district and knows the area like the back of his hand. Tonight it's his turn to cook up a camp stew.