A safari is three days and a decision. This is the decision.
Whether the Mara is worth two more days than Amboseli. What a shared 4x4 costs against your own vehicle. Which Nairobi morning fits before an evening flight. Reviews of every tour you can book in Kenya.
Three days in the Mara, a morning in Nairobi, elephants under Kilimanjaro, a dhow on the reef.
The four bookings a first Kenyan trip is built from. What each one costs, and what the travellers who took it say.
01The three days3 Days Masai Mara Group JoiningShared 4x4, fixed departure, two nights inside the reserve. The trip nearly everyone books first.
02The Nairobi morningNairobi National Park, Elephant Orphanage and Giraffe CentreLions inside the city boundary, then the orphanage and the giraffes. Fits either side of a flight.
03Elephants under the mountainDay Tour to Amboseli National ParkAmboseli in a day from Nairobi. Kilimanjaro sits behind the herds when the cloud lifts at dawn.
04The coast dayDhow Adventure to Wasini Island & Kisite Marine ParkDhow out of Shimoni to the Kisite reef, snorkelling, lunch on Wasini. The other half of the country.
Six places that carry a Kenyan itinerary.
A reserve the size of a county, a park under Kilimanjaro, two Rift Valley lakes an hour apart, red-dust Tsavo, and a reef that starts fifty metres off the sand. Pick the ones your days allow, and the best day out in each.
Shared 4x4, your own vehicle, or a tent inside the gates. Pick the trip, then the park.
Every Kenyan safari is the same animals and a different arrangement. Four ways to do it, what each costs a head, and who each one suits.
★★★★★★★★★★ 4.6 · From Nairobi: 3 – Days Maasai Mara Group Safari by 4WD
Group joiningFixed departure dates, a seat in a shared 4x4, the cheapest way in.
Private safarisYour own vehicle and driver, your own start time, no other schedule.
Lodge safarisTented camps and lodges inside the park gates, game drives at both ends of the day.
Budget safarisCamping, shared transport, three days for what one lodge night costs.
All 79 jeep safaris in Kenya →
The Mara answers three questions: how long, which vehicle, which month.
Everything in the Mara →
Narok county holds 1,500 square kilometres of open grass and the highest density of big cats in East Africa. The drive up from Nairobi is five hours, which is why almost nobody goes for one night. These three carry more travellers than anything else in the reserve.
Three days, two nights in the reserve
Two nights buys you four game drives and a dawn start on the middle day, which is when the cats are moving. One night buys you a long drive and a rushed afternoon.
Land Cruiser, not a minivan
A converted Land Cruiser clears the ruts and gets to the river crossings after rain. The cheaper minivans stay on the main tracks and fill every seat before they leave Narok.
July to October for the crossings
The herds cross the Mara River in the second half of the year. Outside that window the reserve is quieter, cheaper and still full of resident lion, leopard and elephant.
The days out more Kenyan travellers take than any other.
Every Kenyan tour on the site →A half-day inside Nairobi National Park outsells every three-day safari on the site. These are the ones travellers keep coming back to book.
1
Nairobi National Park Half-Day Tour; Free Wi-Fi connection
Join a small-group game drive from Nairobi hotels to Nairobi National Park, where open plains meet the city skyline. Expect 4 to 5 hours in the park, bottled water, hotel transport, Wi-Fi when working, and guides such as Edwin, Lawrence, or Peter. Park entry is separate, and timing or vehicle quality can vary.
From · $45
Read our review →
2
Nairobi: National Park & Optional Elephants & Giraffe Center
from $80
3
NAI NAMI: Nairobi Storytelling Tour with Street Children
from $45
4
Nairobi National Park Half-Day Game Drive
from $36
5
Nairobi: Historic and Modern Highlights Walking Tour
from $23
6
Safari Tour; Nairobi National Park
from $43
7
3 Days Masai Mara Group Joining
from $540
8
Elephant Orphanage and Giraffe Center Tour with Options
from $35
South of Mombasa the safari stops and the reef starts.
Diani runs white and flat for ten kilometres, the Kisite marine park sits an hour further south by dhow, and Fort Jesus holds the other Kenya: Swahili doors, Portuguese cannon, an old town you walk in an afternoon. Most Mara trips end here for a reason.
Naivasha and Nakuru: two lakes, ninety minutes apart, nothing alike.
Nakuru is soda water and flamingo shallows behind a fence that keeps rhino in. Naivasha is fresh, deep and full of hippo, with Hell’s Gate gorge on one shore and Crescent Island on the other, where you walk among zebra because there is nothing there that eats you.
Every Rift Valley day out →
Amboseli is where the elephants stand in front of the mountain.
Kilimanjaro is in Tanzania and the photograph of it is taken from Kenya, from the swamps at Amboseli where several hundred elephants come down to drink. Tsavo next door is twice the size, red with its own dust, and reached in two hours from Mombasa rather than five from Nairobi.
- 1Nairobi: Day Tour to Amboseli National Park & Maasai Villagefrom $75
- 2Amboseli Day Tour from Nairobifrom $190
- 36-Days Masai Mara, Nakuru & Amboseli Group Safari on Landcruiserfrom $1,220
A Kenyan day out, priced from the bottom up.
Every tour on the site, grouped by what it costs a head. The gap between a Nairobi morning and a week in the bush is wider here than almost anywhere.
Nairobi park mornings, the giraffe centre, Old Town Mombasa on foot, a coffee estate outside the city.
Full days out: Hell’s Gate and Naivasha, the Kisite dhow, Amboseli and back, the Carnivore table.
Everything with a night in it. Three days in the Mara, Tsavo from the coast, private vehicles and lodge camps.
Three things that happen in Kenya and almost nowhere else.
Plenty of countries have game parks and good beaches. A million-animal river crossing, a lake that turns pink from the air, and an elephant nursery open for one hour a day are not among them.
The Mara River Crossings
Around a million wildebeest and a couple of hundred thousand zebra move north out of the Serengeti in the middle of the year and have to get across the Mara River to do it. Crocodiles wait at the fords. The herds mass on the bank for hours, sometimes days, then go all at once. Nobody can tell you which morning, which is why the camps that overlook the crossings sell a season ahead.
- 13 Day Maasai Mara & Migration safari★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 28 reviews
- 23-day Masai Mara Safari Tour to see the big five and wildebeest migration★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 11 reviews
- 33 days Masai Mara wildebeest Migration Budget Safari★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 8 reviews
A Maasai Manyatta
The reserve is named after the people who live around it, and the villages on its boundary receive visitors on their own terms: a fee agreed at the gate, the jumping dance, a look inside a house built of dung and ash by the women who own it. Go in the morning, ask before photographing anyone, and expect the beadwork stall at the end. It is how the fee gets spread around.
- 1Nairobi: Day Tour to Amboseli National Park & Maasai Village★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 310 reviews
- 2Masai village Day Tour Experience★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 284 reviews
- 3Maasai Village Experience Day Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 72 reviews
The Sheldrick Nursery
On the edge of Nairobi National Park the Sheldrick Wildlife Trust raises elephant calves whose mothers were lost to poaching or drought, and opens to the public for one hour in the middle of the day while they are fed and mudded. Keepers sleep beside them. The calves go back to Tsavo when they are ready, and some of them come back years later with calves of their own.
- 1Elephant Orphanage and Giraffe Center Tour with Options★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 457 reviews
- 2Nairobi National Park, Elephant Orphanage and Giraffe Centre★★★★★★★★★★ 4.6 · 365 reviews
- 3From Nairobi: Elephant Orphanage and Giraffe Center Day Trip★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 235 reviews
Four Kenyan bookings that run on somebody else’s calendar.
Most of this country can still be arranged from a hotel desk the night before. These four run on a season, a river, a one-hour window and a tide, none of which care when your flight lands.
- 013 Day Maasai Mara & Migration safariThe crossings only happen between July and October, and the camps with a view of the river are taken a season in advance.
- 02Nairobi National Park, Sheldrick Elephant, Giraffe Centre TourThe nursery opens to visitors for one hour a day. Slots are limited and the gate closes on time.
- 03Climbing Mount Kenya 5 Days Via Chogoria RoutePoint Lenana is a four or five day walk, huts are booked by the party, and the two dry windows in January and August fill first.
- 04Dhow Adventure to Wasini Island & Kisite Marine ParkThe dhow out to Kisite sails on the tide, and the marine park trips stop running when the southern monsoon turns the sea over.
April and May, the tracks turn to soup and the plan moves indoors.
The long rains run from late March into May and the short rains arrive in November. Black cotton soil in the Mara stops being a road, lodges drop their rates, and the animals scatter over green country that is hard to drive. The answer is the same every year: stay in Nairobi and on the coast, where the good half-days are under a roof or on a paved street.
The only capital with lions inside the city boundary.
Nairobi National Park runs to the airport fence, which means a half-day game drive before a flight is a real thing and not a consolation. Pair it with the elephant nursery and the giraffe platform at Langata and the whole morning is done by lunch.
By place — parks, lakes and the coast
By kind of day — drive, walk, boat or table
Nairobi, Naivasha, Nakuru, the Mara, then the reef.
Just reviewed, in date order.
Back through the archive →
Tsavo East National Park: 2-Day Tour from Mombasa
Read our review →
Lake Nakuru Day Trip Safari – & Optional Lake Naivasha Boat
Read our review →
Hell’s Gate Guided Tour with Option Boat Ride at Lake Naivasha
Read our review →
Hells Gate with Hiking Biking Climbing and Camping in Kenya
Read our review →