A very special tree in Nairobi...

At the legendary Stanley Hotel in Nairobi, Kenya, stands a very special tree.

From the early 1900's, there used to be a famous railway line that lay like a slender black gleaming snake right across the length of the African continent, from Cape Town to Cairo one could travel in the luxury of a puffing, chugging steam train. Imagine! Crossing the vast savannas of this great continent, steaming through the dense jungles, skirting the giant lakes and inland seas, sipping tea at eleven and buttering cream scones as you gaze over the hills of the highlands of British East Afrika, or listening to the sweet tones of the old grand piano as the ice tinkles in your gin and tonic and you watch the sun set over the dales of Tanganyika. And then, when you reach the excitement of the frontier town of Nairobi, you step off the train for a few leisurely days' stay at the elegant wood-panelled Stanley Hotel where you can wash off the dust and grime of the journey in a hot steam bath and mix and mingle with the rich and the famous, the great white hunters and the smooth-talking entrepreneurs who are looking to Africa for their fortunes, the diplomats and the colonial officials, the authors and the biologists.

And then, after a few days, you board the train once again where it has stayed parked in front of the hotel, and resume your journey to the land of the pyramids and pharaohs.

And, during your sojourn, you will spend some time under the great old thorn tree which stands in the courtyard of the hotel's tea room where, if you are lucky - you will find a little note pinned for you by a lover, a friend, a relation, an associate, who had passed by this way some time before.

The "message tree".

The mystic nature of the acacia tree as a 'messenger' is as old as the Bible when people left messages for each other either pinned or tied to trees along a pathway. In Japan is lovely custom of tying prayers written on strips of paper to the branches of trees. Here in Nairobi, the tree became the 'post office' of the African traveller more than a century ago.

And today, although the original thorn tree (genus acacia xanthophildea) does not exist anymore, the current young tree is a third generation sweet thorn that stands in the same spot as the original. Instead of pinning messages onto the tree it self, there is now a notice board around the tree where you can find messages left by fellow travellers, backpackers, adventurers, and explorers of our time. And although the railway track no onger passes in front of the hotel as it did then, the Thorn Tree remains the most famous meeting place in East Africa.

Way back in 2003 I flew to Nairobi to meet up with my children who were then, as I am doing now, travelling through the continent on the back of a truck. My daughter had been ill and I needed to assure myself that she was going to be all right, and I also desperately needed by that time to get a big hug from my son again -- and meet my future daughter in law, so I booked myself into the Stanley Hotel and my daughter and I spent two days talking and talking, she had one hot steaming foam bath after another, we went shopping for a 'new aura' for her -- a brand new turquoise and pink tent with a roof that could open to the stars at night, and in a little ceremony where we painted each other's toe nails a bright blue, we made a pact to come back to Africa one day and do something to make a contribution to making the world a better place -- and meet at the Stanley Hotel in Nairobi.

I wrote a message of welcome for her on a piece of paper at the time and pinned it on the thorn tree -- in case she should arrive there before I did. As it happened, she did return to Nairobi not too long after to work for a UN ngo involved in the repatriation of Sudanese refugees at Kakuma near the Northern border - and as a result -- long story -- decided to to study medicine, which she has now done. It took me much longer to get back - and sadly not - as yet - with any such noble contributions. So this time, when I went to the Thorn Tree, I left another note -- this time for my granddaughter -- and the note is now pinned to the tree with a red button attached...

Perhaps, one day soon, you will be able to read the message I wrote for her on the Thorn Tree blogspot. Click on http://stanleythorntree.blogspot.com and have a look at some of the messages that are there today. No tips on where to find the biggest tuskers on the next hunting expedition or where Rich got mauled by a rogue lion or where Cynthia suggests she and Rodney could possibly meet without her husband finding them or where Aunt Emily hopes to catch up with her cribbage party in Upper Volta, but the messages are as charming and heartwarming and touching and romantic.

And I hope the tree will keep my red-buttoned note to Zara safe -- until she too, one day, comes travelling through Africa and stops at the Stanley Hotel to pick up her messages...