Adventures on Mt. Elgon Farm in Kenya with The Women of Faith
Our Director Leila went on quite an adventure to get up to Mt Elgon where we are starting a farm. Read Leila's Story below.
On 12th September I visited Mt Elgon, my primary reason for going up there was to identify the land and see where it’s located, if it’s ideal for planting since we wanted one near a source of water, also to meet the owner and finish the lease transactions.
I left Nairobi the night of 11th Sept to catch an 8 hour bus that leaves at 8pm and arrives in Kitale at 5am, the journey is uncomfortable due to bad roads and that makes it difficult to sleep. I arrived at 5 and waited in the bus till there was light outside, I took a taxi to my sisters place and rested for an hour. I then started getting ready for my journey to Mt Elgon, by 8am on Monday I was boarding a Matatu (van), public transport, to go the last town that the car reached. I met with Hezron and we took a pikipiki (motorcycle), it was around 11am and the weather was already changing it was about to rain and we were 3 in one pikipiki. It was hard, long and tiresome because we had to get down and walk most of the time because the Piki couldn’t move up the mountain so it had to be pushed. Before reaching our destination it started raining heavily, the only thing we could see was a tiny hut, we ran inside and found an old grandmother with 2 grandkids, this is them.
They welcomed us in. We were so hungry they offered us all they could afford- boiled maize.
We thank God that trip was a success, even when it was full of obstacles , this is how muddy it was
Even though I had challenges getting up the Mountain due to heavy rainfall, I managed to see the land and meet the owner, we went to the chief’s office where we met the lawyer’s representative and some village elders as witnesses, the transaction went smoothly and we leased 2 acres of land at a cost of 24000/- , the lease is for one year effective January 2023.
We are free to start our next planting season which starts late December early January, we will do a series of 3 planting seasons the first is potatoes.
This is at the local administration office it’s the only nearest government office that all business is done in.
