Masai Mara Safari

“You can open that little widow on the side,” our confident pilot suggested in his lovely British accent. Huh? How did he know I was about to toss my cookies, along with my entire lunch? Maybe my silence and intense focus on the horizon tipped him off. So routine this was for him, nonchalantly balancing his full, uncovered coffee cup on the floor between our seats.

It was my idea to charter a small plane to take our family 180 miles across Kenya’s rift valley, a flight that both couldn’t end soon enough (my opinion), and was the highlight of our safari (my family’s opinion). The scenic and romantic "Out of Africa" travel mode, my research suggested, was much preferred to the overland route. We’d have a bird’s-eye view of the savanna as we glided above arid planes and fog-kissed mountains.

I booked our Cessna 206 through well-established and trustworthy Tropic Air Kenya, and planned our departure from Nanyuki, a small market town on the equator and a common departure point for safari destinations throughout the country.

The Nanyuki Airfield is also home to Barney’s, a reputable café where you can enjoy a meal on the wide verandah while waiting for your flight (highly recommend the chocolate milkshake. Also, highly recommend avoiding said milkshake if you’re prone to motion sickness and are about to take off on an ever-so-slightly-bumpy flight).

I felt the first uneasy pangs about half an hour after take off. “Do you maybe have a little bag or something? Just in case…” Our Robert Redford doppelganger pilot reached into a latched compartment in front of me and handed over a stack of small white paper bags with attached twist ties, like the kind that holds roasted coffee beans.

I don’t know which was more humiliating, heaving or missing out on the stunning view of Kenya. The rest of the family was contentedly taking it all in, sharing their sightings of distant animals, lakes and rivers, and forested mountains rising from the parched desert. I could hear their conversation, and the pilot’s narration as we flew low over a mountain summit, between rocky outcroppings. Apparently the circular Maasai homesteads had been replaced by reserves of roaming elephant, zebra and giraffe. I had to take their word for it, and hope they were taking plenty of photos.

I just kept my eyes locked on the horizon and promised myself I’d use anti-nausea meds next time. This flight deserves to be more than a once-in-a-lifetime experience, with or without Denys Finch Hatton.