Love brewed on the mountain

Love brewed on the mountain

http://www.standardmedia.co.ke/mobile/?articleID=2000104260&story_title=love-brewed-on-the-mountain

By Peter Muiruri
Kenya: As Valentine’s Day beckons, it is time to share romantic stories, of love that inspired great things.
The forests of Mount Kenya might seem an unlikely place for such a tale, but true love knows no limits, not even topographical ones.
Located 190 kilometres north of Nairobi, the Fairmont Mount Kenya Safari Club has a revered elegance, and is the ultimate destination for many international celebrities. Among those who have visited this alluring getaway are former US president Lyndon Johnson, Britain’s Sir Winston Churchill, Omar Bongo of Gabon and South Sudan’s Gaafar Numeiri.
Like many of Kenya’s pre-war dreams, Mount Kenya Safari Club was conceived of a love affair — an older woman and a handsome aviator — born on the playground of wild Africa.
The story started with a woman, Rhoda Lweinsohn, who had been married to a millionaire from New York. In a bid to ‘enjoy life to the full’, she left her family in the USA and came for a holiday in Kenya. Here, she fell in love with Gabriel Prudhomme, a young French pilot with his own aeroplane. She soon discarded her husband and married Gabriel.
Eager to build their home in Kenya, the couple chose the slopes of Mount Kenya, and settled on a piece of land that belonged to a Mrs Wheeler. She only agreed to sell the property if Gabriel flew to France to cremate her dead husband, brought the ashes to Kenya, and scattered them over Mount Kenya. Gabriel obliged, and the couple got the property.
Rhoda called their home Mawingo (from the Kiswahili word mawingu) for the clouds that still hover over Mount Kenya.
In 1948, Mawingo was bought by Abraham Block and turned into an inn.
The fortunes of the inn changed forever when in 1959, when film actor William Holden and his three friends stayed there to recuperate after a game-hunting safari. They were captivated by Mawingo’s charm and bought it, turning it into the now world famous Mount Kenya Safari Club.
The creation of the retreat reads like a fairly tale, only that this time round, it is a true story.
Mount Kenya Safari Club has blossomed over the years, and boasts luxurious cottages with sunken baths, and a golf course where the first tee points to the tip of Mount Kenya, Batian. In the vicinity is William Holden’s pet project, the 1000-acre game reserve that has become the Mount Kenya Wildlife Conservancy.
This is perhaps the only hotel in the world where a husband and wife can spend the night in different hemispheres — but in the same room. It is here that you take a bath in the northern hemisphere and watch TV in the south, the clearly marked signs of the equator dissecting some of the facilities in half.
From almost every angle of the club, the highest point in Kenya, and second highest in Africa, looms large on the horizon.
The communities around hold Kirinyaga, or the specked mountain, in awe. And visitors are also usually spellbound; few can believe that there is a mountain on the equator with snow all year round.
For those who make it to this jewel in the wild, the words of Roger Upton, a previous visitor, resonate:
“A secret mountain, wreathed in cloud above wooded hills. She shows her height then coyly hides her beauty again.  Mawingo, built a home of love and grace amid these lovely hills. Opens now her gentle arms to others that would come, who wish to be part of ageless beauty, happiness and hope. The ‘cloud of Kenya’ shall remain home.”
May the romance of Mount Kenya live on.