Wagon Trails - Small group adventure holidays and safaris in Africa

Kenya and Tanzania - 14 days

Kenya Overland Trip

Trip Cost - £375

(Local Payment - UK£ - 200) What's This?

Included

Masai Mara Game Reserve.

Extras

Visas, Personal Insurance, International flights

Optional extras:

Hell's Gate Park cycle ride, Crescent Island, Longonot Mountain. Ngorongoro Crater and Serengeti National Park. Other side trips are available.

Day 1: Saturday

We leave Nairobi and descend into the Great Rift Valley, pausing at the lookout with amazing views en route. We then depart for Nakuru town and the working farm of Kembu Camp. We spend the afternoon here.

The camp has good facilities and a bar. We stay here for two nights.

Day 2: Sunday

Lake Nakuru National Park is only 60 kilometres across the valley floor. It has the largest herd of black rhino in East Africa, around a million pink flamingos; who are part time residents and more than 400 other bird species. 'Nakuru' means 'place of the waterbuck' in Swahili and these antelope abound in the park as well as impala, buffalo and warthog. The lions here sit in the branches of trees. We leave Lake Nakuru after a morning game drive and visiting Nakuru town to return to Kembu Camp.

Days 3 & 4: Monday & Tuesday

Across the floor of the Rift Valley we set up our tents under the trees of Fishermen's Camp, on the shores of Lake Naivasha. Lake Naivasha is well known for its hippo population that comes ashore every night to graze. The camp is protected by an electric fence which stops the hippos coming too close.

Nearby is Hell's Gate National Park where you can hire bikes to take you around the park and see the herds of zebra, buffalo, hartebeest and gazelle. There is spectacular scenery here; red cliffs, grassy plains and rock towers made of hardened lava, the remains of ancient volcanoes. It's a hard ride but well worth it. Or you can spend the day on the lakeshore, spotting the rich variety of African birds.

There are more species of birds on this one lake that there are in the whole of the UK.

Also on the lake is Elsamere, once the home of Joy Adamson and Elsa the lion of 'Born Free' fame. Elsamere is now the centre of the Born Free Foundation and you can find out more about their work, see the rare Colobus monkeys and take afternoon tea in the gardens. You can visit Crescent Island the film location of 'Out of Africa', where you can wander with a guide amongst African wildlife in lion free surroundings.

The camp has a good bar restaurant overlooking the lake and good facilities.

Day 5: Wednesday

We climb out of the Rift Valley and over the Mau escarpment passing through the Masai capital of Narok. We enter Masai Mara Game Reserve from the east. The Mara must be one of Africa's most famous Parks, and justifiably so. Here herds of elephants browse among rich, tree-studded grasslands. Thomson's gazelles, zebra, eland and many more species of savannah game offer a rich choice for the predatory lions, leopards and cheetahs that hunt in the reserve and the surrounding areas. The camp is a simple site on the edge of the park, among the animals.

Day 6: Thursday

We spend a day game driving in the vast, game-filled plains of the Masai Mara and either camp at acacia or return to Narok town to camp.

Day 7: Friday

We return to Naivasha and you have the chance to go bird watching on the lake shores, or to climb Mount Longonot, an extinct volcano. Or you can take a boat out on the Green Crater Lake.

Days 8 & 9: Saturday & Sunday

We return to Nairobi where we spend the evening feasting at the famous Carnivores Restaurant you then have the opportunity to sample the nightlife of Kenya's capital. Visit the Giraffe Sanctuary and Karen Blixen's house. We stay in a campsite with full facilities.

Tanzania

Day 10: Monday

We cross the Masai plains to the border town of Namanga, and departing Kenya for Tanzania. We spend the night at a campsite near Arusha the northern capital of Tanzania. The camp has good facilities, a bar and restaurant.

Days 11 & 12: Tuesday & Wednesday

Serengeti Park & Ngorongoro Crater. We take 4x4 vehicles with a guide to cross the Rift Valley, passing through the Crater to the vast plains of the Serengeti to look for animals and spend the night on the plains. We spend the next day game driving through the park and climb to the rim of the Ngorongoro Crater. The two nights camping in the parks are very basic but very exiting, the Serengeti camp is right in the middle of the park and the camp on the crater rim is cold and high in the clouds, when the mist clears - amazing.

Day 13: Thursday

Early in the morning we descend to the heart of the crater to see the game. The Crater is a collapsed, extinct volcano, thousands of years old and supports a wide range of wildlife. It's an excellent place getting close to the animals, as in a small area there is a high concentration of animals un-afraid of vehicles. After lunch we leave the crater and re-cross the floor of the Rift Valley to Arusha The camp has good facilities, a bar and restaurant.

Day 14: Friday

On this the last day of your trip we return you to Nairobi on the Impala Hotel shuttle bus which departs at 8 am and arrives in Nairobi at approximately 1 pm.

OVERLAND PRE-DEPARTURE INFORMATION