More than heaven

Mount Kenya, at altitude

Among my many defects is the inability ever to be satisfied. We have two children and I want more. I have 29 cattle and I want a lot more. I live in the most beautiful part of Kenya and I covet other people’s big ranches. I walk into other people’s houses and I think, ‘Hmm, I’d like this. I wonder how much it costs?’ I want, I want, I want. And when it comes to big boys’ toys I’m like Toad in Wind in the Willows.

My latest infatuation is a $2 million helicopter owned by Jim on the neighbouring private game reserve of Loisaba. Now, I’ve always loved choppers. I like Black Hawks, Hueys and especially Cobras and Apaches. But Jim’s machine is the ultimate in luxury. Bubble windows all over, even under your feet. Stereo. Fully loaded. Jim has done it up in go-faster stripes with flashes of yellow, red and purple. It also has strobe lights on the rotor blades. The other day Jim and I were drinking a cocktail he mixes called a ‘beauty’ (five parts vodka, one part something else) and I asked him if the strobes flash even during the day. ‘Uhuh,’ said Jim, who’s American. ‘Sucker lights up like a Christmas tree.’

Yesterday Humphrey, the Loisaba pilot, asked me if I wanted a ride in Jim’s helicopter. People call Humphrey the ‘male Mary Poppins’ because of the trips he can take you on. ‘Yeurr!’ I said. This morning he landed on the front lawn. I jumped in and we were off. Humphrey is ex-British army and he does stuff that is pretty scary. He can fly vertically until the machine nearly stalls, then flip to one side and fall towards the earth like a sycamore seed in the wind until the blades kick in at the last moment.