Nariokotome, site of the Turkana Boy discovery.

Lake Turkana, famously known as the Jade Lake from the turquoise color of its water, sits in a broad shallow basin situated between the Ethiopian highlands to the North and Kenyan highlands. Lake Turkana is also one of the northernmost of a series of lakes that lie in the great rift valley, the giant continental trench that runs south from Tanzania and into the Red Sea in the north. The two major rivers the Omo from the Ethiopian highlands and the Turkwel from the Kenya highlands feed the lake.

Today the weather is quite hot and dry because the two highlands block moisture creating a rain shadow and restricting the flow of air currents. Seasonal rivers running across the land cut breathtaking arrays of valleys exposing ancient rock layers preserving fossils from the present, all the way back to the time when the dinosaurs roamed the continent.

The current lake is less than 10,000 years old. The landscape during the time of the Turkana Boy would have been much the same, except the area was much wetter. A large ancient paleolake occupied the approximate location of the current lake at the time the Turkana Boy lived in the area now known as Nariokotome. The landscape was covered by a thicker cover of grasslands dotted with scattered trees.

Project Director: Zeddie Loky

Project Manager: Jimmy Muwombi

Contributions: Dr. Richard Leakey Dr. Isaiah Nengo