A Long Lens in Kenya

A Long Lens in Kenya is a photographic journal resulting from our travels to Kenya. It covers Amboseli National Park in the South to Samburu National Reserve near the Northern Frontier District. The crater lakes of the Great Rift Valley and the Central Highlands are also represented. 

It was a set of rough wooden alphabet blocks that induced an early intrigue with the magic and mystique of the African continent. I have an obscure but poignant memory of siting on my maternal grandmother’s knee and her patient encouragement to discern elephant from oryx, giraffe from antelope and lion from cheetah as the blocks were presented. It’s a warm and pleasant early childhood memory from a rustic farm kitchen.

To walk ground that our earliest hunter gatherer forebears roamed invokes a reverence for this ancient land. The fossil records from Kenya bear witness to our ancestors from more than two million years ago. 

The dreamy romanticism of Karen Blixen’s ‘Out of Africa’ projected a enduring mystique of an East African wilderness paradise to those beyond its borders. 

It was in more modern times that Kenya threw off the British colonial yoke to become a republic in 1964 and now hosts a population of 48 million. Like many African nations, the colonial past and transition to self rule bear witness to myriad challenges and injustices that continue to linger. 

Kenya straddles the equator from 5 degrees North to 5 degrees South. The Great Rift Valley bisects Kenya from North to South and host a string of volcanic lakes. It’s one of the world’s great wildlife destinations and Pam and Wayne have been privileged to make four visits from 2009 to 2017.  Their books have been downloaded in 38 countries