Growing up in Africa was something that I will never regret. We didn't have the amount of indoor entertainment that has been necessitated by the Canadian climate. Instead we spent some time outside.

We lived on the side of the Great Rift Valley. There was a fairly steep 1000 metre drop from the plateau at the top to the valley floor. Above us was forest. The railway to Uganda ran right at the forest edge, and was the path to one of my favourite spots.

Four kilometres along the railway was a stream that had eroded a gully in the hill side. There was a huge fill where the tracks passed over a long curved, dark tunnel that the stream ran through. This was the area we called "Hot Springs". We used to go there on school hikes when we were younger, to walk through the tunnel in the dark and scare out the bats that lived there. Hot water flowed out of the ground just below the tunnel and joined the stream.

In ninth grade I went with some friends to find out what was above the railway. A path led some way in where a small dam had been built to supply water to the railway when it was powered by steam. Beyond that we were on our own. The stream bed was very rocky, so we could walk right up the stream most of the way, but we usually had bets on who would get their sneakers wet first.

Eventually we came to what we came to call "The Falls". This was a series of about ten waterfalls, ranging in height from a few small 5 meter falls, to three or four that must have been at least 30 metres high.

This was as close as I came to exploring the unknown. It was untouched before we were there. I hope that the damage we did cause has disappeared since. On some Saturday mornings a group of four or five of my friends from school would make up a few sandwiches, throw some odds and ends into a pack, and head off for a two hour hike to the falls.

If you have ever thought of the beautiful African jungle, forget it. This was filthy. There was much vegetation, but also steep slopes. You were on your hands and knees a lot, and grabbing vegetation to stop yourself sliding down through a jungle to the stream below. We also could expect rain at any time.

To get around different falls required different amounts of effort and ingenuity. The walls around the falls were extremely steep, and it was difficult to find a path up. Between two falls we had to edge along the base of a cliff above a very steep vegetated slope. At the shortest point, there was still a 3 m cliff of loose rotten rock. Our first time up, we spent most of an hour deciding what to do. There was an old dead tree trunk leaning up against the cliff at the shortest point, but we didn't want to trust it. With all other alternatives wiped out, we tried it, climbing between the tree and the cliff. It held, and we used it for the next four years. At one point in the climb we had to traverse a cliff, partly by walking on top of bushes growing out of the cliff, then along a ledge just wide enough to be called a path. You could look down through some scrub brush and see water probably 100 m below. It was not a comforting feeling.

The isolation was beautiful. Almost walled in on three sides, with the open side looking out over the Rift Valley. I spent several nights up there, some in the open, watching the bright stars of the black African night slowly crossing the gap straight above. In the background was the roar of the water going over the falls. Once we had climbed around several the falls we would settle down to relax. We had one favourite area. There was a large slab of rock that the stream flowed through in a channel, which gave a fair sized open area, and room to move. The falls below dropped straight off this to rock nd plunged down, making a dull, steady roar as the hit below. We could look through a gap far south down the Rift Valley, yet were almost inaccessible. Two minutes walk upstream bought you to another fall. This one wasn't as big, but had a nice pool at the bottom, and a small cave carved out behind it. The water was cold, but that never stopped us from going in. These falls were beautiful in the early morning light.

I did my first overnight backpacking to the falls. We went ill prepared, but mostly over prepared. We knew nothing of the art of camp cooking, and carried an array of food, that, while good might have been better left in the kitchen. I remember once carrying a coffee cake all the way through the climb around the falls, including the dead tree trunk, only to have someone lay on it. So, we had squashed coffee cake, but it sure tasted good.

Fires were an interesting aspect of camping. We would build a fire out of dead wood on the slabs of rock near the stream. After a couple hours, for some reason a thin plate of rock would separate with a loud explosion, sending a shower of sparks in the air. On one of our camping trips we built up the fire in the morning so we would have a fire left to cook some lunch on. We then headed up the falls to see how far we could get. We were stopped at a huge fall some ways up. We were looking for some way around it when we heard a huge explosion down the hill. We figured that might have been the reason that we never had any wild animals around!

We discussed a few times whether any girls would be capable of making it 'up the falls'. We never did decide anything, but we figured that most of them couldn't make it. We never did get to find out, I guess none of us were brave enough to ask any girls to join us!

We often talked about naming the different falls. There was a group of about ten of us who knew the area, but we could never come up with any names that anyone else would accept. So we continued to talk about 'The Falls', 'The Slide', 'The Camping Place', and 'The Second Falls'.

The bottom fall was actually a natural water slide. There was a gouge in the rock with a deep pool in it. The two sides were near vertical, the water flowed down the slide, through the pool, over a lip and down another short fall before meeting the stream proper. It was tricky climbing up this part. We could beat our way through the bush and climb around it. However, it was easier to climb up the rock, cross the lip, the climb the near vertical side to the top. On one occasion I passed a pack across the stream to someone. As it passed over the pool, it emptied itself, including my camera, into the stream. It survived a very short soaking as I caught the strap as it went in. Later in the day I realized that I was missing an altimeter and a knife that had been in my pack. I knew they had been in the pack, so they were probably in the pool at the bottom of the slide. I wasn't looking forward to getting them out as it would mean immersing myself in cold water. I needn't have worried. Climbing down the slope above the pool, the handful of grass that I was holding on to, pulled out, dropping me, with a scream, 5 metres straight into the pool. I was where I wanted to be, and didn't even have to take the time to get used to the cold water, however, I hadn't planned to leave my clothes on! On a later trip I stood on the lip where the water flowed out of the pool, and took a series of pictures of a friend coming down the slide.

In my senior year of High School, I was taking most of the senior portraits for the yearbook. One of my friends wanted to have his taken at the falls. I agreed, on the condition that he took mine while we were there. Neither one of them came out very good, but whenever I look at it I'll remember the good times I had at the falls.

I was back to Kenya a few years after I left. My friends from school had separated all over the globe. One day I took our dog for a walk and got as far as the small dam where the path ended. I couldn't make myself go any further. I discovered that it had only been enjoyable because of other people to enjoy it with.

We found an untouched corner of Africa. It is unfortunate that we didn't leave it behind that way. We slashed paths through the virgin forest, chopped handholds in the rock, threw rocks down over the falls, and left garbage behind. We realized that we were doing damage and tried to minimize it. We thought about pulling the vital tree down from the cliff, but never did. I hope that little corner of Africa can again be the spot untouched by man.