As a Kenya virgin I’d been hoping for some classic “Out of Africa” scenery and Lewa did not disappoint. A nine-seater Cessna took me north on the one hour journey from Wilson airport in Nairobi. Coffee and tea plantations and thick forests around Mt Kenya gave way to an arid, parched landscape. Scrub, dappled green and brown as far as the eye could see, was criss-crossed by dirt roads with flat-topped acacia trees scattered randomly towards the horizon.

I expected Robert Redford to drop out of the sky in his bi-plane at any moment to be met by Meryl Streep coming down from the big house with a jug of lemonade to sooth the equatorial thirst. All that was missing was a haunting sound track and migrating wildebeest in the distance.

My plane plopped smoothly onto terra firma, the pilot closing down the engines and handing me a business card before I slipped out of the back door. “Mtumishi Humphrey Nguma – Rainbow Faith Ministries: Preparing you in difficult times on earth for settlement in God’s Kingdom”. I felt like asking him to say a prayer for me as I ran the following day, but he was busy unloading luggage, and then quickly off again, to Sumburu, to pick up more passengers and head home.

I hopped in a Landrover, heading for the small tent city that had sprung up to cater to the 750 runners. In the shade of a tree, just 50 yards from the road, a lone rhino sheltered from the dry heat. It didn’t seem bothered by our presence, watching us watching it and nonchalantly sauntering off into the bush when it had tired of our intrusion.

That was the theory. My “jwalks” (part walk, part jog) became increasingly frequent, replacing any actual running towards the end, as my legs turned to lead, and my heart almost pumped out of my T-shirt. I blame the altitude. My head was saying “go on, go on, run!” My body was answering back with a string of Anglo-Saxon expletives, the gist of which was a simple “no”.

()Towards the finish a group of elephants, who’d left large quantities of their calling card on the track, watched us under a canopy of trees, about 100 yards away, kept at a safe distance by gun-wielding wardens. They seemed fairly unperturbed at the site of 800 people disturbing their morning routine, although if they’d really wanted to use the path instead of us, I’m sure they would have had the right of way. After all, I wasn’t going to argue with several tonnes of stroppy pachyderm.

The next Safaricom Marathon will be held on Saturday June 23, 2007. For more details see www.tusk.org. Companies that can organise entry to the race as well as flights and safari/beach packages before or afterwards include Tim Best Travel (www.timbestravel.com), 2:09 Events (www.209events.com) and, in the USA, Marathon Tours (www.marathontours.com).

Marathon du Médoc (www.marathondumedoc.com), September. An hour north of Bordeaux in France, this marathon runs among vineyards of about 60 châteaux, including Château Mouton Rothschild. Wine samples are given out every 2km, with steak and oysters towards the finish.

Tromso Polar Night Half Marathon (www.msm.no) January. In mid-Winter the sun doesn’t rise above the horizon in this Norwegian town way above the Arctic Circle, although there is a kind of eerie twilight for about an hour or so before midday. Still, by the time you set off on the 21km course at 3pm it will be pitch black, with a good chance of seeing the Northern Lights overhead.

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