A homely lovers’ getaway

By Tony Mochama

Nakuru County is one of those places in the country with a variety of experiences for honeymooners, long-term lovers or the seriously engaged.

When I first checked into Nakuru as a child on a road trip en-route to Kisii with my parents, there were just two nice places for people to stay.

Pivot Point, which I recall I liked a lot because then in the ‘80s, it had a lot of ‘Mararo’ pinball machines (perfect gaming for a nine-year-old lad).

But then in the middle of the night, there was a bomb threat and off we sped to the more staid Stag’s Head Hotel, with its mahogany, gleaming burnished stairwells, and mounted stag heads with glassy gazes off the walls.

Seclusion

Today, a honeymoon couple can go to conventionally cool places like the marvellous Merica Hotel. Or, as the unlikely coincidence of this particular John Mayer song playing on radio as this writer types this with the 7am sun streaming through glazed glass, "you’ve got the afternoon, I’ve got a place for two, come and discover me … discovering you."

Just off the main Nakuru highway from Nairobi, on Section 58, a couple intent on a really private lovebird experience, and ready to live/love off the beaten track, can go to the Ufanisi Nakuru Resort.

Behind a hedge, this homely lovers’ hideaway opens to a small villa with a compound which, if driving, will house one’s vehicle for days on end, leaving the lovey-dovey to nestle indoors.

The outside comes with a porch to relax in outdoors and enjoy the fresh air and each other’s conversation.

Home-cooked meals

Inside, there is a beautiful lounge area with a prettily tiled floor, oak doors, large plasma TV (for those like me who can never really tune out of the news and EPL) and a dining area.

All meals are cooked on order by staffer Kerubo, everything taken care of by the lovely Ann with a warm smile and fabulous hospitality.

The kitchen also comes with a variety of juices, wines, beer and liquor on order.

The rooms are elegant, each unique in its own fashion.

From the basement rooms that are straight out of a children’s fairy-tale (for couples with children), to the ‘White House-ish’ pink, blue and yellow rooms, to the suite that comes in wood, with its own patio outside for a couple to relish.

The owner, Isabelle Lumumba, designed the rooms, so they come with personalised, dainty, delicate, feminine mystique inherent in them.

The fabulosity of Ufanisi in Nakuru is its utter affordability, with rooms ranging from Shs 3,000 – Shs 6,000 a night, while letting a couple have the run of the place.

They say ‘ a man’s home is his castle.’