Bombolulu & Holler Park

 March 20, 2025

"In Kenya you've got the great birds and monkeys leaping through the trees overhead. Its a chance to remember what the world is really like." ~ Joanna Lumley

Today was another chance for us to learn what this part of the world is really like. I'm sure they must exist in Mombasa, but I didn't see a single grocery store anywhere. (I discovered later that Woolworths is a grocery store in Kenya, but the only sign I saw was one in a mall in one of the better off parts of town.)  However, the roadsides are lined with markets, some more permanent like this fruit stand under a corrugated metal roof, others huddled under large umbrellas touching tip to tip and stretching back into darkness between the stalls. 

Our tour began after 1:00 which accounts for the picked over appearance of this market. It will spring to life again after the sun sets. This is Ramadan, remember, and this mostly Muslim city will stir itself to life in the twilight and this market will be packed with shoppers cheek by jowl as the Muslims prepare to break their fasts. Kenya at large is 70% Christian, but Mombasa is primarily Muslim.

Our first stop was Bombolulu. It's a village set aside for Kenyans who suffer from some disability--mobility issues, blindness, deafness, etc. Here they can live and are educated, and trained in making jewelry, fabric printing, leather work, and mobility device construction. The goal is for them to learn a trade and be able to eventually leave to start their own business or be employed in an existing business. If they are unable to, they may stay on indefinitely, safe and cared for.

This lovely young woman was twisting gold into earrings. Her crutches were lying beside her desk. 

The fabric printing shed didn't produce a batik-like piece with the pattern visible on both sides, but I love the unique artwork displayed here. 

After touring the workshops, we visited the recreated homes representing various tribes. The Swahili house was most recognizable as a home to me. There was a door, and entry way, an interior staircase leading to the crenelated roof, a separate kitchen (shown below), living area and bedroom. It was also made of coral stone and had a sense of permanence. 

The kitchen included a handmill, some pottery and a small cooking pot with a place for a small fire beneath it. The Swahili (which means People of the Coast) home showed heavy Arab influence in its construction and sense of privacy.

The other structures had a more nomadic feel, as if they could be torn down to relocate the timbers and replace the grasses or elephant dung that covered the lashed-together frames. Women construct most of these type of homes. 

A group of folkloric dancers performed for us then. The entertainment was long on energy. And one of the men was able to do something that seemed physically impossible. He clasped his hands over his head and did a sort of "jump rope" move with his own arms, flinging them backward and stepping through them over and over again without changing directions. I was too shocked by what I was seeing to look away long enough to try to video it. Why his tendons weren't stretched thin as rubber bands, I have no idea.

Our next stop was Holler Park. This is a beautiful example of how a company can give back. This part of the Kenyan coastline has built up over the millennia on a base of ancient coral reef.  Holler Park used to be a coral quarry. When the company finished extracting coral to make cement, they realized they'd created a "coral desert"--a place where the land was too depleted after removing the organic remains of coral to support the original plant life. So they searched for trees and shrubs that could grow in the soil as it was, and gradually the soil was naturally replenished and fertile again. (Beautiful Butchart Gardens in Victoria, Canada is another example of a cement company reclaiming their former quarry sites.) 

Giant clam fossils dot the entire park, testimony to the fact that once this entire area was covered by the Indian Ocean.

Then we were introduced some of Kenya's fabulous animals. We had a 3:00 date for a giraffe feeding (check the DH's photo montage for a shot of me making friends with these gentle giants with long purple tongues). 

The animals are a huge draw for this kindergarten class, but their teachers decided naptime in the shade of a neem tree was not something they could miss. Not that the kids were interested in sleeping. Doesn't that sweet little girl with her chin on her hands look like a Botticelli cherub?

In addition to giraffes, Holler Park is home to hippos, monkeys, various poisonous snakes, giant tortoise, oryx's and yellow crocodiles. Some of the animals are here because they need rehabilitation. This female hippo has milky blue eyes and I suspect she's blind. The gamekeeper who came to feed her had to put the head of lettuce directly on the round stone in front of her.

Notice the momma monkey by the hippo's back foot. Little green monkeys were clattering through the canopy above us all over the park and occasionally venturing down to gaze at us curiously. This monkey's baby is clinging to her belly, tight as a tick! The monkey didn't seem to bother the hippo at all. Evidently, inter-species cooperation and friendship happens.

Hippos in the wild are very aggressive animals and are responsible for 500 human deaths annually. The gamekeeper who feeds this fellow daily still stands behind an electric fence to toss heads of lettuce into his gaping maw. Nobody can break a "river horse."

Didn't want to make friends with this fellow.

Most gemboks have two long horns. This one is sort of like an African version of a unicorn with one long horn and the other only a small curl behind his ear. Clearly a disadvantage if this gembok wasn't in Holler Park. 

Yes, these animals are not technically "in the wild." But we were able to see a lot of animals pretty close without them being caged. In fact, we actually saw more different species than some of our friends who went on much longer drives (3 hours one way to reach the game reserve, then 5 hours back on account of traffic).  

We had a very satisfying day all around.