This month, a gang of 12 packed into a little minivan and headed into the heart of Masaai country: Olorgesailie.
Located along Magadi road, two hour's drive and 70kms away from Nairobi, Olorgesailie prehistoric site is world renown as the "factory of stone tools" and the place in the world with the largest number of excavated prehistoric hand tools. The prominence and accumulation of human tools represents actual camping places of early man and evidence that human species had a tropical origin. The site is in a lake basin that existed about 100,000 to 200,000 years ago. Researchers Dr. and Mrs. Leakey, started investigations on the site in 1942 where they found important evidence that concerns the habits and activities of early prehistoric peoples of the Acheuleus or "Hand axe" culture. Olorgesailie has excellently preserved biological and cultural evidence about the evolution of man. If you'd like to visit, see more information on the National Museums of Kenya website.
We didn't expect to take so long to get there, so started our picnic in the van:
The views on the way there were gorgeous:
And the mud turned white...
We could see a few small dust storms in the distance:
But this HUGE dust/rain storm quickly gathered and arrived at Olorgesailie at exactly the same time as us:
Our guide Danson told us lots of interesting facts:
We played with some bones:
And some hand tools:
On our way out, we stopped at the Masaai curio shop to buy necklaces for the girls and bracelets for the boys. The artisans are local Masaai women:
One of the masaai necklaces:
Melody's beetle necklace:
Joy's blue heart:
