7 Days Wildebeest Migration Safari

Your driver guide collects you from your Nairobi hotel or the airport after breakfast. You drive north through the tea and coffee farms of the central highlands to Nyeri, about three hours, and have lunch at the base hotel.

In the afternoon you transfer up into the Aberdare National Park forest to a tree lodge built over a waterhole. From the viewing decks you watch elephant, buffalo, bushbuck and giant forest hog come to drink, and the waterhole is floodlit after dark.

Activities: Drive through the central highlands, tree lodge waterhole viewing in the Aberdare forest
Meals: Lunch and dinner  ·  Overnight: Tree lodge, Aberdare

After breakfast you drive west to Nyahururu to see Thomson’s Falls, a 72 metre drop into a forested gorge, then descend into the Rift Valley to Lake Bogoria, about four hours in total.

After lunch you drive along the lake shore to the hot springs and geysers, where boiling water bursts from the ground. When conditions are right, thousands of lesser flamingo feed on the soda lake, and greater kudu live in the bush around it.

Activities: Thomson’s Falls, drive into the Rift Valley, afternoon at the Lake Bogoria hot springs and geysers
Meals: Breakfast, lunch and dinner  ·  Overnight: Resort, Lake Bogoria

You head south and cross the equator at Mogotio on the way to Lake Naivasha, about three hours. A boat trip on the freshwater lake takes you close to hippo pods, fish eagles and pelicans.

In the afternoon you cycle through Hell’s Gate National Park between tall cliffs and steam vents, past zebra, giraffe and buffalo. You can also walk into the Ol Njorowa Gorge with a local guide.

Activities: Equator crossing, boat trip on Lake Naivasha, cycling in Hell’s Gate, optional gorge walk
Meals: Breakfast, lunch and dinner  ·  Overnight: Lodge, Lake Naivasha

After breakfast you drive through Narok and the wheat farms of the Mara, about five hours, arriving at your camp for lunch.

Your first game drive starts in the late afternoon as the predators begin to move. In migration season the plains may already be full of wildebeest and zebra.

Activities: Drive to the Masai Mara, evening game drive
Meals: Breakfast, lunch and dinner  ·  Overnight: Tented camp, Masai Mara

A full day in the Mara with a picnic lunch. In migration season your guide follows the herds towards the Mara River, where Nile crocodile and hippo wait and the crossings take place.

You can start the day with a hot air balloon flight at sunrise, followed by a champagne breakfast on the plains, at an extra cost.

Activities: Full day game drive with picnic lunch, Mara River, optional balloon flight
Meals: Breakfast, lunch and dinner  ·  Overnight: Tented camp, Masai Mara

A second full day to follow the herds and look for lion prides, cheetah and, with luck, leopard in the riverine trees.

In the late afternoon you can visit a Maasai village to learn about the community’s way of life, before a final drive back to camp at sunset.

Activities: Full day game drive, optional Maasai village visit
Meals: Breakfast, lunch and dinner  ·  Overnight: Tented camp, Masai Mara

After breakfast you drive back through Narok and climb the Rift Valley escarpment, passing the small chapel built by Italian prisoners of war in the 1940s.

You stop for a farewell lunch, then arrive in Nairobi in the afternoon for a drop at your hotel or Jomo Kenyatta International Airport.

Activities: Drive back to Nairobi via the Rift Valley escarpment
Meals: Breakfast and lunch  ·  Overnight: Departure