It would be hard to find anyone who doesn’t have a Kenya Safari on their bucket list. A chance to see some of the world’s largest mammals in their natural habitat is something we’ve dreamt about since we were old enough to watch The Wild Thornberrys on Nickelodeon. After spending 6 days, in 3 national parks, in Kenya, we can confirm it was positively “smashing!!”.
For many, the biggest obstacle to a Kenya safari is the price. We’re here to tell you it is far more affordable than you’d expect and the budget safari company we booked with was amazing. Below we’ll outline the 3 parks we visited and the wonderfully unique aspects they all have to offer. We’ll also break down the price and the accommodation, and tell you more about the company we booked with.
Day 1: Meeting the Maasai Tribe
We were collected from our hotel in Nairobi early in the morning and departed for Maasai Mara National Park, the first stop on our Kenya safari. Along the way, we got to stop at an amazing viewpoint of the Great African Rift Valley. Lying on a divergent plate boundary, East Africa is slowly pulling away from the rest of the African continent; it will eventually form its own landmass in the next few million years. What has resulted from this is a huge valley which extends from Ethiopia all the way down to Mozambique, collecting water from the elevated land on either side.
This means a mass congregation of wildlife and some of the most famous parks in the world lie along this rift – 3 of which we will talk about below.
After the viewpoint we drove for another few hours before we arrived at the Maasai camp, a key highlight of our Kenya safari. Here we got to meet the local Maasai tribe who are famous for their impressive jumping. We’ve met a few tribal groups along our travels and it’s always a special experience – the Maasai were no exception. They showed us their traditional dances and rituals and even let us join in.
We were then shown to our beautiful hotel, just a short drive from the Maasai village. We got an early night as we had our hot air balloon safari very early the next morning (we have a full article on this experience if you would like to read it here).
Day 2: The Maasai Mara National Reserve
The next morning we entered our first park and spent the whole day searching for wildlife. Perhaps one of the most famous parks in the world, the Mara Reserve was the only of the 3 parks we had heard of before embarking on our Kenya safari.
Have you ever seen a nature documentary with thousands of wildebeest crossing a raging river while trying to avoid crocodiles and lions? Chances are that’s the Mara River!
Every year from July to August, over a million wildebeest cross the river from the Serengeti to look for greener pastures in the Mara reserve. Sadly we were a few weeks too early to see the great migration but it was still amazing to see the famous river and the surrounding park.
It wouldn’t be possible to list all the animals we saw on our first day but we can say it was far more than we expected (this was true for all the parks we visited on our Kenya safari).
We saw a pride of lions lazing about, families of elephants and giraffes, herds of wildebeest, zebra and water buffalo, we even had 2 cheetahs come right up to our vehicle. After lunch, we got a guided walk with a park ranger along the banks of the Mara River where we got to see hippos bathing and huge African crocodiles. This was the one and only time we were allowed out of the vehicle, which felt surreal but strangely safe with our armed ranger.
Days 3/4: Nakuru National Park
Day 3 we drove a few hours north to Nakuru National Park. Nakuru is smaller than Mara but lies around a huge lake which attracts some unique wildlife not present in the Maasai reserve, making it an essential stop on any Kenya safari.
Thousands of pink flamingos are attracted to the lake’s algae which in turn brings an abundance of other wildlife. The highlight of this park though had to be the Southern white rhino. Nakuru is one of the best places in the world to view these gentle giants and is one of the major success stories of conservation – their status has changed from “endangered” to “near threatened” in recent years. We got to see a family of them right up close.
Unfortunately, this park has been affected by prolonged rainy spells in recent years. The level of the lake has risen and drowned the surrounding trees, destroying natural habitats for many creatures who call the lakeside home. This created a strangely beautiful and contrasting aesthetic – the vibrant pink of the flamingos standing out against the dark grey of the dead trees. It’s not all gloom and doom though, the remainder of the park, away from the lakefront, is still very green and also a great location to view leopards – sadly we didn’t see one of these elusive creatures but we met many other people who did.
Days 5/6 – Amboseli National Park
This was hands down our favourite of the three parks we visited on our Kenya safari. Don’t get us wrong, the other parks were spectacular, but this one blew us away! The highlight here had to be the amazing views of Kilimanjaro.
Sitting right on the Kenya-Tanzania border, on a clear day the magnificent strato-volcano is visible from everywhere in the park. The Maasai sometimes refer to Kilimanjaro as the ‘Mountain of Water’ or the ‘lifegiving mountain’ and the reasons soon became clear. Glaciers atop Kilimanjaro slowly melt and the water filters down through fissures in the volcanic rock. The meltwater then resurges in huge swamps and lakes throughout the park – turning an otherwise arid region into an ecological paradise.
Huge herds of elephants flock to the area and it is one of the best places in the world to view them up close. Some of the elephants here were the biggest we had ever seen. It’s even home to the world’s largest elephant – Craig! We didn’t see Craig but we did see other gigantic bull elephants walk right past us, dwarfing our large safari truck and paying us no mind. The view of the elephants with Kilimanjaro in the backdrop is still something we dream about to this day. Truly a breathtaking experience on our Kenya safari.
Price and booking
Now down to the brass tacks. We opted for a 6 day/5 night Kenya safari. The company we booked with offers different tiers of packages depending on what type of accommodation you wish to stay in (Budget / Medium / Luxury). We opted for the medium package at 1100 USD per person.
This included everything – pickup from the hotel in Nairobi, entrance to all 3 national parks, guided game drives every day with the same driver, all accommodations including breakfast, lunch and dinner and dropoff back to Nairobi. They also offer shorter packages for cheaper and longer packages if 6 days aren’t enough to satisfy your wildlife fix.
Our hot air balloon safari was also extra and you can see the price of that in our other article HERE.
Now here is the part we wish we knew before we booked. For each of the tiers the actual Kenya safari experience is the exact same, the only difference in price is due to the accommodation. This meant that we were on the same safari each day with people who had booked the budget package (a total of only 600 USD). The day-to-day was the exact same, the only difference was we got dropped off at different accommodations each night. In our opinion, this really makes the Kenya safari experience very affordable if you’re a budget traveller. You can sacrifice some luxury if you like and still get the same wildlife-viewing experience.
You can also pay more for a private Kenya safari. We opted for a shared safari and had two other couples in the same vehicle as us. It was still very comfortable with everyone getting their own isolated seat and plenty of space to stand up and look through the roof hatch in the parks. We honestly had such a great time with the two other couples and made great friends so we’d recommend the shared Kenya safari even if you can afford the private.
The accommodation and food.
We are usually budget travellers and always go for the cheapest accommodation option. For this Kenya safari trip, we decided to opt for the medium package – it was Kubra’s first holiday in a while and we didn’t want to take any chances. The only thing we can say after this experience is that we can’t imagine what the luxury option includes because our medium package was insane.
We stayed in 3 of the nicest hotels we have ever stayed in over the course of 5 nights. Everything from the food to the rooms to the service was exceptional. We honestly asked our game driver if they had made a mistake with our booking as we couldn’t believe this was the medium package.
The food is buffet style in each of the resorts and all you can eat (alcoholic drinks not included but super affordable). The hotel you stay in also provides a packed lunch for your Kenya safari the next day and we were always given more than enough. We never went hungry on any of the 6 days that’s for sure.
From talking to our fellow Kenya safari friends who picked the budget option – they had zero complaints about their accommodation as well. Not as luxurious but they all slept well and had decent food throughout.
Below are links to the hotels/lodges we stayed in if you want to check them out for yourself:
Jambo Safari Lodge (Mara Reserve) http://www.jambomara.com/
Sarova Lion Hill Game Lodge (Nakuru) https://www.sarovahotels.com/lionhill-nakuru/
AA Lodge Amboseli https://aalodges.com/aa-lodges/aa-amboseli/
The safari company
We shopped around online for quite some time and found huge differences in prices. We eventually opted to go with All Scenery Budget Safaris for our Kenya safari and honestly could not recommend them enough. Their website is here https://www.allscenerybudgetsafaris.com/
They were so easy to deal with from start to finish. A Kenyan company, offer much more affordable prices than the Western companies do (honestly, after seeing their prices we are convinced they are scams – over double the price for what seems like the same experience).
We sent them countless emails and questions after we booked our Kenya safari and they were always quick to respond, friendly and helpful. Our tour operator, Lizzy, was the one who responded to us each time and this added a lovely personal touch.
They even collected us from the airport when we first arrived and brought us to our hotel for no extra charge (even though we spent 3 days in Nairobi before the Kenya safari package began). They also helped us book our train to Mombasa after the Kenya safari when we were struggling to figure out the website. Both the airport pickup and Mombasa train had nothing to do with the package we had booked with them but they were more than happy to help us out. Our driver, Josef, was with us from start to finish and was so knowledgeable about the wildlife, helpful and friendly.
Our only criticism of the company was that their headquarters in Nairobi was difficult to find and not in the best location. Besides that, everything was perfect – we gave them a 5-star rating on Trip Advisor (something we very rarely do).
General tips to make your Kenya safari experience all that more special
Buy a good zoom lens for your camera! – This is something we really regret. There is amazing viewing throughout all the parks and there are plenty of binoculars for seeing those more reclusive animals, but our camera wasn’t always able to pick them up. We think it would be worth it to invest if we were to go again.
Spend some time in Nairobi before your Kenya safari – We did this and we did not regret it. The museum, elephant sanctuary and BOMAS all gave us great context for the safari. See our full article about Nairobi here.
Check the seasons! – Certain times of the year (the great migration for example) are far more popular than others and prices skyrocket. Also bring layers, some of the parks are at high elevations (Nakuru for example) and get cooler than we expected.
Bring a neck pillow – the safari vehicles are well able to deal with the off-road landscape of the parks but it can still get bumpy.
Book something relaxing for after your Kenya safari – 6 days was the ideal amount of time for us but we were pretty tired after it. We went to a place called Diani Beach for 5 days after our Kenya safari and it was the perfect way to round off the trip before our long flight home. We will have another article all about Diani coming soon!
If you love Kubra and Bens article, make sure to check out their other articles on Africa HERE!
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