Nyeri expats

Greetings,
I am a dual citizen of USA and Kenya. I lived in Nyeri for many years - and we consider it our home area. However, we now live in Machakos County. Please feel free to contact me if you have questions or just want someone local to bounce ideas off of.

Hi thanks for your reply.  Do you have children and where did they attend school in nyeri? Whereabouts in nyeri were you located and where would you recommend.  At first I was thinking nanyuki.  But really hoping to hear from as many people as possible.  Funny that as I considered machakos!!!

Kind regards
Njeri

Our children were all born when we lived in Nyeri. But our "baby" is nearly 31 years old now. Our kids went to Mt. Kenya Academy. It was a relatively new school then. Over the years our kids attended local schools (such as Mt Kenya Academy), home schooled, and attended international schools. Two of our 3 children still live in Kenya.

Nyeri is much more Kenyan than Nanyuki - which has a large expat community. We've never lived amount expats, preferring to build community with locals. I don't know about the current school situation in Nanyuki.

We are in the process of retiring. I serve on the faculty at Daystar University. We are currently looking to purchase some land high on the slopes of Mt Kenya in either Nyeri or Kirinyaga counties. We prefer the cooler weather near the mountain and the areas seldom experience drought.

Our second son and his wife are teachers at Rift Valley Academy in Kijabe. They both went to high school there, and are now back as faculty members. RVA is an excellent international school that mainly focuses on missionary children.

Please feel free to discuss with us whatever you'd like to.

Blessings,

I have also lived in Nyeri and we have a house there.  I agree with the previous post that Nyeri is much more Kenyan than Nanyuki (which has a British military base and a large expat community).   Not many expats in Nyeri, but that has never bothered me.  My wife is Kenyan and I have always preferred to live away from expats.   I have always been comfortable to walk around Nyeri on my own.  If we want any UK food products, or nice western restaurants, we went to Nanyuki - its not very far.

Our house is adjacent to the Baptist High School, outside Nyeri itself.  It's a quiet area and we have never experienced any hassle.

Ring Road Estate is the most upmarket estate in Nyeri and we looked at a few properties there.  There are a few properties close to Mt Kenya Academy (Gamerock), which is a reasonably secure area. 

We found that the main problem with the property market was the brokers, who seem to become involved, whether invited or not and want a % of the sale.  There is inevitably more than one.  In our case, we bought from a Scottish woman, who had been forced to return to Scotland by poor health.  Her daughter handled the sale and refused to pay the brokers, who then threatened us.  We were immediately forced to install an electric fence and eventually give them a small amount to make them go away.

Absolutely vital to spend time looking.  We have bought several properties over the years and as a general rule, my wife does all the negotiating, while I remain in the background.  This avoids artificially raised prices, caused by the ongoing assumption that all westerners are incredibly rich.  We based ourselves at Davies Court in Nyeri, as prices are reasonable and its in a good area of the town.

With the rehabilitation of the railway, Nanyuki is anticipated to be more 'up and coming' than Nyeri, which the railway bypasses - maybe something to think about.

Schools in Nyeri:  Our granddaughter, who lives with us, went to Mt Kenya Academy and this is arguably the best choice of school, in Nyeri.  Its Kenyan system, but with the option to do GCSE at the senior school.  She had previously attended Braeburn in Thika, a UK curriculum school.  I would say that a 9 year old child would make the transition quite easily, but 12 and 14 years may struggle and may have to slot into one year below, in order to get used to the system.  The Kenyan system is quite full on in terms of academic workload.

There is Brickwoods and Braeburn in Nanyuki, both UK curriculum. 

One thing to bear in mind is that the UK schools on Kenya follow the UK academic year pattern, with a long break during the coldest months, whereas the Kenyan year is the reverse to this, with the academic year running from Jan to Nov.

Thanks for all your help

This is a bit later but I read this thread and wanted to know...are you currently living in Machakos town?  My American friend has been living in Tala for two years, teaching pastors,  and has not even been to Machakos or met anyone except those in his class.  When I tell him I'm concerned that he will turn into a hermit, he just laughs.

Lol... he is probably living his best life...lol. ne we settled for nakuru.

I just dabbled upon this thread and realize my yearnings to resettle my family in Nyeri or Nanyuki have been partially answered. However, I long to know the status quo at the moment because most of these Convo were some years ago and we are about leaving Nairobi with our 3 children; 5, 3 and 1 year old respectively. Any information that can help us resettle in terms of business opportunities, work, school and security will be highly appreciated.