#1: [03-Apr-05]

#2: [15-Nov-10] (incomplete)

20-Sep-2013 -- On my second trip to Kenya, I made another attempt at this Confluence, this time with two colleagues with whom I was teaching. We had meetings at Mount Kenya University, a new and vibrant university on the east side of Thika, and then taught a geography class for 200 secondary students at the Chania Girls High School on Haile-Selassie Road. This was one of the highlights of the entire year for me with the students looking spiffy in their uniforms and excited about all things geography and web mapping. After teaching, we drove northwest on the road, past the reservoir there, to the Thika Super Highway. It was here that we had our closest approach to the confluence point. The weather was quite fine; not too hot; about 83 °F (28 °C) under partly sunny skies. The terrain was delightfully hilly and the vegetation wonderful; the streets full of life.

Alas, just as in 2010, we ran out of time: We had an appointment to tour the Post Modern Library at Kenyatta University. We turned south on the Super Highway toward the university. The library was only a few years old and really quite extensive and wonderful. However, it was yet another case of "so close and yet so far". I thought that two days later, I might be able to make another attempt, but sadly, that was the weekend of the terrorist attack on the mall in Nairobi, and I was too nervous to travel at that time. Moreover, it did not seem right to be traipsing around the terrain when so many lives had been taken and families shattered. I wish all those who were impacted peace and healing.

I was hopeful that with new and old friends that I now have in Kenya, that I would be invited to return, and the third attempt at this point will be successful.