Blue Post Hotel #2: Two Rivers Junction
The cache is one of four hidden along a beautiful nature trail at this fascinating old colonial hotel in Thika. See Blue Posts Hotel #1: Chania Falls GC3TMBE for directions to the hotel and info on the history of the hotel and access to the trail.
To find the cache: continue along the trail from the Chania Falls/cache heading down the Chania river passing through the fine old riverine forest. The cache, a small rectangular food container with a blue lid, is hidden about 3m off and 1m below the trail on the river side in the roots of one of twin large trees under some small rocks. GPSr accuracy here was only about 7m, probably because of the tree cover, but the description should be adequate to facilitate the find.
The cache location is just before a banana plantation and some 100m from the junction of the Chania river with the Thika river which then continues as the latter until it joins the Tana river, which flows into the Indian Ocean.
. . . The hotel location has much older significance too which has connections with the origin of the name Thika which is thought to be the Kikuyu word Guthika, meaning to bury. During a great drought long ago, the Maasai were forced to venture outside their normal territories to search water and grazing for their huge herds of cattle. The Thika and Chania rivers pass through Kikuyu land and provide sustenance for the agricultural Kikuyu. With this water in contention, and both tribes desperate for survival, they fought a bloody battle that left few survivors. The Maasai were defeated and banished from the area. A mound near Blue Posts Hotel is supposedly where the dead warriors were buried.
See here for more information on Thika and here for an interesting Thika blog page . . . (continues with Blue Posts Hotel #3: Rocky Hollow GC3TMCD)