Evolve Kenya
If the idea of lying on a decorative couch powdering your nose, wrapping yourself in expensive furs and eating buttered snails out of your butler's hand doesn't do it for you, Evolve Kenya will. This life-changing exploration will get you face to face with the beauty, cultures, people, social hardships and wildlife of Kenya. You'll come back not only with a tan and a cluster of new Facebook friends but with a new sense of awareness about your self, your strength and your ability to change the world.
First we'll make camp on a wildlife reserve (don't worry, it's as safe as your own backyard). Then we'll spend a week helping out at a local school and a children's orphanage. After shaking hands and exchanging business cards with elephants on a day-long safari, we'll depart for a two-day bike trek followed by taking some camels for a day-long pilgrimage.
From day 15-20, we'll immerse ourselves in the local cultures - helping patients in a mobile medical clinic, visiting a rose farm, shopping, and even throwing spears like a traditional Masai warrior.
July 26 - Aug 15, 2013
Day 1: Touch down
We'll meet at the airport and transfer over to Hillcrest School in Karen where we'll stay over, chatting late into the night about the mysteries of life - including but not limited to how Justin Bieber's hair stays like that.
Day 2: Wilderness camp
We'll start by winding through Kikuyu villages, small farms and a seriously impressive mountain that the other mountains are jealous of. Then we'll reach our wilderness camp in a private wildlife reserve and be briefed on what's to come and how to induce vomiting in a lion if it swallows your fellow travelers (hint: feed it brussel sprouts, no species can tolerate them).
Day 3-9: School project (it's not what it sounds like)
We'll spend a week helping out kids at a local primary school, visiting a children's orphanage in Nanyuki, experiencing Kenyan cultures and learning about their lives. This is a major trip highlight: you'll get to form relationships with the locals and make a positive difference, not to mention having a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to get mercilessly beaten at soccer by people half your age.
Day 10: Safari
Get in licking distance of an elephant and other exotic, slightly terrifying but totally lovable animals during the all-day wildlife safari.
Day 11-12: Bike trip
Trade in your khakis for bike shorts: day 11 starts an epic two-day bike trek into the Laikipia heartland (warning: do not attempt to arm wrestle any Masai warriors you meet). We'll camp out in tents overnight, when suddenly out of the dark comes Hookface, the ghost of the serial killer, ready to take his revenge -- wait, where were we?
Day 13: Camel-walking
Now you can pretend those bike shorts never happened: we'll be traveling on foot as nomads for the next couple days, accompanied only by some very pleasant camels who we've paid a handsome salary to carry our stuff. Don't worry, you don't have to have the physical endurance of Lance Armstrong to keep up - we cover around 9km a day and the itinerary's flexible for those of us who are used to spending our afternoons in front of the soft blue glow of Facebook.
Day 15-17: Clinic, market and lodge
We'll set out with a mobile medical clinic, helping patients and witnessing the harsh conditions of life in this district firsthand. Then we'll visit the bustling Nanyuki market, dine at a local restaurant, and visit a flower farm where hundreds of Kenyans work, growing roses to be exported into Europe. For our last activity on this leg of the journey, we'll learn about Masai traditions and mythology and walk to a manyatta (Masai homestead). Prepare yourself for the zombie apocalypse by trying out local bush skills like spear throwing or lighting a fire with sticks. (No cheating. You won't have the luxury of cheating when the zombies have risen.)
Day 18: Mpala Safari
If you screwed something up Day 10's safari, here's your chance to make up for it! We'll go on an early morning and evening game drive through beautiful Mpala and visit the Mpala Research Centre.
Day 19: Nanyuki Hospital & Shopping
We'll visit the hospital in Nanyuki and see the lack of facilities and overcrowding that many of these medical centres suffer from. Talk to the doctor on duty about the challenges they face as medical practitioners in rural Kenya, and contribute to the community's economy by souvenir-shopping for friends and family back home.
Day 20: Take off.
We'll head to Nairobi for dinner before heading to the airport and going our separate ways. Warning: although the trip is over, it will stick with you forever - not unlike gum on a sidewalk, except this gum is made out of life-changing experiences, truth, beauty and incredible memories instead of saliva and pink gunk.
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