We knew we were in Africa as soon as we saw the immigration officers laughing and smiling at JOMO KENYATTA INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT. What a welcome change from the usual grim formality, which is intimidating even when you have nothing to hide at the best of travel times! 

The modern airport works really well and there are ATMs so that you can get cashed up for tips and incidentals, one of my travel must-dos (see my other TEN COMMANDMENTS).  

As we drove to GIRAFFE MANOR, we passed through the city of Nairobi, weaving through congested traffic in the rain, past quite modern brand Japanese cars and buildings that were a mix of very modern, and some quite run down. We took the LANGATA ROAD past Nairobi National Park's main gate and THE BOMAS OF KENYA, which is a display of different kinds of Kenyan tribal villages in miniature, all in one spot.

We arrived at the manor quite late into the evening, and were met by Marian and Rudy a lovely couple who run the manor so professionally. 

Giraffe Manor looks like a colonial private home; it is quite cosy in a luxurious, baronial way. The grandeur of double height ceilings, ornate timber, fireplaces and oil paintings is balanced by fabrics in warm neutrals, hand stitched cushions, country house furniture and brass tubs with sunflowers and other giant blooms. 

Many interesting or high-profile explorers and guests have fallen for the charm; there is that undercurrent of raw African wildness beneath the colonial, aristocratic veneer.Beyond the prettily manicured gardens, Giraffe Manor is surrounded by 140-acres of indigenous forest, which is scrubby and full of many other wild animals other than the warthogs and giraffes who roam the grounds.

The setting is quite a mythic place: there are views over the famous Mt. Kilmanjaro and author, Karen Dinesen, whose farm was made famous in “out of Africa,” lived only a few miles away. An earlier owner of Giraffe Manor even bought all of Blixen’s furniture.

Originally built in the 1930s by wealthy toffee makers, the Mackintosh's, it was modeled on a Scottish ancestral manor. Fittingly, Scottish nobility bought it later. ‘Jock,’ and his American wife Betty, took in two endangered ‘Rothschild giraffes’ - the rare breed who had lost much of their natural habitat in western Kenya and once faced near extinction. The couple soon became passionate conservationists, starting a breeding programme on the estate.