Sometimes people ask us “what has been your favorite trip.” It’s a tough question to answer because each place is unique and different. But after traveling to Kenya for an 11 day safari, I finally have my answer! This safari was truly a once in a lifetime trip that will forever be one of my favorite memories of traveling. In under two weeks, we got to see so many incredible animals, stay in beautiful places, and learn about the local culture.
I would have never guessed that I would be such a big spokesperson for experiencing a Kenyan safari, but after less than two weeks of travel, I have already told so many people that they have to experience an African safari. The animals were amazing, but the biggest reason our trip was so memorable was because of the company Capture Kenya Expeditions and its founder (and our guide!) Henry Gathura. (Read our full blog post about Capture Kenya here.) They went above and beyond to make sure that every detail was custom designed to fit our favorite things and have the best possible experience in Kenya!!
Our mission for our time in Africa was to be able to photograph the big five. The big five animals are the lion, leopard, rhino, elephant, and cape buffalo. Based on previous wildlife experiences, we knew to hope for the best but expect the worst. This is the wild and not a zoo. There’s no way to guarantee that wildlife is going to be at the place we were doing the things we wanted to see. And we knew that realistically we weren’t going to see the same things that the Animal Planet spends years to capture and shows only a few minutes of the highlights! Like all travel, having lower expectations and enjoying the journey is the key to any travel experience.
However, we maybe should have set a higher goal than to see the Big 5 :) Capture Kenya Expeditions made sure to book us in areas where we would be staying right next to major populations of elephants, rhinos, and cape buffalos. As for the cats, Henry was able to use his 20+ years of safari guide experience to make sure we not only saw, but were within 15 feet, from multiple different big cats!
About Capture Kenya Expeditions
I can’t write this post without first explaining more about Capture Kenya Expeditions and the owner Henry Gathura. I am sure that we would have had an amazing time on our own exploring Kenya, but Capture Kenya is the reason this trip went from a memorable experience to our favorite trip of all time! Capture Kenya is a local Kenyan travel company that specializes in creating personalized safari tours throughout the country of Kenya (as well as other countries in Africa). The company is completely Kenyan owned and managed. After all, who knows Kenya better than someone who has lived there their entire lives. The owner and founder of Capture Kenya, Henry Gathura, has more than 20 years of safari experience. From food, transportation, lodging, and making sure that we had the most memorable experiences of a lifetime, Capture Kenya planned it all. We told the company what we were hoping to experience and how many days we would be in Kenya, and they took care of every single detail of the trip from the moment we stepped out of the airport!
Capture Kenya Expeditions has a passion for conservation and sustainability. Because they are locally owned and operated, they have a deep love for the local people and wildlife of Kenya. Capture Kenya books with camps, lodges, and conservations that are also passionate about preserving Kenya’s beautiful wildlife. We came to Kenya for a safari, but also left learning so much about the local culture and people. It is a great feeling knowing that by booking through a locally owned company that cares deeply about conservation and sustainability we were in a small way helping to support Kenyan locals and wildlife.
Our Itinerary
Capture Kenya Expeditions did an amazing job at creating the best itinerary for a Kenya safari for our trip! To help us remember our itinerary during our time in Kenya, Capture Kenya printed a bound itinerary with details about the different places we would be staying and animals we would hopefully see. This was our itinerary for our 11 day safari.
Samburu National Reserve
After spending the first night in Nairobi, our first official stop of our 11 day Kenya safari was to Samburu National Reserve. If this was our only safari experience, it would have been worth it! We went from never seeing a wild warthog to having wild elephants walking through our camp on the first night in Samburu!!!
One of the things that made this area so special was Elephant Bedroom Camp where we stayed. We were so excited to see wild animals on game drives and we had no idea just how close we would be able to stay to wildlife! Capture Kenya Expeditions picked the most perfect first place to stay.
Elephant Bedroom Camp doesn’t have a fence around it, which means any local wildlife is able to come directly into the camp. The camp is located along the riverbed which makes it a popular area to spot wildlife. Before we even checked into our room, we were greeted by a massive bull elephant! This was the first wild elephant that we had ever seen and it was walking through the camp where we were about to sleep!
During the afternoon, we had to padlock our tent to keep the local vervet monkeys from unzipping it! And at night, we got to fall asleep to the sound of baboons and elephants! Although we were sleeping in the heart of the African bush, this was anything but “roughing it.” Every day we had incredible three course meals. Our “tent” was almost as big as our apartment (and definitely more luxurious)!
The staff was incredibly friendly and welcoming! We were especially thankful for the guard who kept us from walking directly into a bull elephant at night! This was such a cool place to stay for the first couple nights on our safari!
Samburu National Reserve was an incredible introduction to our first of several game drives! Samburu National Reserve’s landscape is best characterized as the African bush. The horizon is covered by low growing vegetation, making it the perfect place for predators and prey to hide. The riverbed is like the main highway for the local wildlife. Everything from baboons to lions venture to the river to cool off and drink.
During our three game drives, we saw dozens of elephants, giraffes, zebras, antelopes, and several other animals that we had never seen before! For big cats we also saw a lion, cheetah, and leopard! Henry would ask us what we’d ideally like to see for the day, tell us the best time of day to see it, and then take us for our own personalized game drive!
My highlight of our Samburu game drives was seeing the big cats. We were able to see a cheetah eating from less than 15 feet away! The most exciting part of the drive was tracking down a leopard after spotting its kill wedged up in a tree.
Henry used his 20+ years of guide experience to locate the leopard hiding down by the riverbed. (Of course Em and I were a big help! We were able to use our experience of never even seeing a wild leopard to point out rocks and logs that we thought for sure looked “exactly” like the wild leopard we were trying to find!) Spotting the leopard was an incredible adrenaline rush! Even though we never even had to take a step, our hearts were racing like we just ran sprints!!
Em’s favorite Samburu experience was the countless number of elephants! In addition to having elephants walk through our camp, we saw them all around the park! At times we had to stop the car as 20+ elephants crossed the road in front and behind us! There were elephants that came within 5 feet of our car. It was incredible to see an animal that can weigh up to 14,000 lbs so close to your vehicle! Henry told us that a group of elephants are called a memory. So of course I’m obligated to write a cheesy pun about how it was a “memory” that we’ll never forget! :)
Ol Pejeta Conservancy
The next stop on our Kenya safari was to the Ol Pejeta Conservancy. If Samburu National Reserve was the African bush, then Ol Pejeta Conservancy is the African woodlands. This stop was all about rhinos and relaxing in luxury. Located on the equator and at the foothills of Mount Kenya – Africa’s second tallest mountain – Ol Pejeta definitely did not disappoint!
We went from never seeing a rhino in the wild to seeing more rhinos than we could count! Ol Pejeta Conservancy is home to the only two remaining Northern White Rhinos in the world. Due to poaching, the rest of their species has been killed.
Unfortunately, the remaining two rhinos are both females and not able to reproduce. The good news is thanks to modern technology, the conservancy hopes to preserve this species through surrogacy of a similar rhino species. Henry told us that these two rhinos are probably the most popular rhinos in the world! And they are under 24/7 protection. Ol Pejeta Conservancy has done a lot to help protect and preserve several species of rhinos.
In one area of the park, we were able to touch and hand feed an old rhino named Baraka that has lost his eyesight. It was amazing to feel their tough, armor-like, skin and see how big their horns are up close! Throughout the park, we saw dozens of black and white rhinos.
By our third game drive we were laughing at just one day earlier we wanted to stop and take pictures of rhinos that were hundreds of feet away. But we saw so many that by the end of our time there, we would drive past the same sight and not even turn on our cameras.
Although rhinos were the highlight of Ol Pejeta, they were far from the only animals we saw. During our drives we saw elephants, giraffes, cape buffalo, and several types of antelope. During the evening we saw more than a hundred baboons walking in a line to find the resting spot for the night. Seeing the little babies riding under their mom’s belly was very cute. We were very fascinated by the massive number of baboons, but to many Kenyans baboons are often thought of as the common animal that at times can be considered a nuisance. So Em and I taking hundreds of pictures of this “exotic animal” would be like someone visiting the US and taking hundreds of pictures of squirrels.
Our favorite animals of these game drives were the cheetahs and lions. Resting in the shade about 15 feet from us were two male cheetahs. Seeing these animals up close is easy to see why they are the fastest land animals in the world. Everything about them is built for speed. But they definitely do not compare in size to the two massive male lions we spotted on an early morning game drive.
Em and I were casually looking out the side windows when Henry spotted the two lions crossing the road in front of us. These were the first wild male lions we had ever seen and they were so much bigger than we imagined. Seeing them in person makes it easy to see why they are called the king of the jungle (or in this case king of the savannah 😉). They were strolling into the woodlands pretty quickly so we weren’t able to take too many pictures, but the one did pause long enough to pose for a few closeups. 😁
Another animal to see in Ol Pejeta are chimpanzees. Although they aren’t native to this area, the conservancy has been the home to several chimps from Western Africa for several years in order to help protect them from poachers. Because they aren’t naturally from Kenya, the chimps are kept separate from the other animals. In this area, we took a walking tour with a local guide who explained how the conservancy works to protect and preserve the chimps living in the conservancy.
Although chimps share 98.6% similarity to human DNA they can be very aggressive and territorial. Even while we were visiting we saw a “family squabble” when a bigger chimp stole some food from a smaller one. Because of this we could only see the chimps from the other side of the fence. It was a lot of fun getting to learn about these primates and see them in person.
In addition to all of the animals, another highlight of Ol Pejeta was living in luxury at Sweetwaters Serena Camp! We stayed in Sweetwaters’ luxury tents. These tents take the term “glamping” to a whole new level! The walls are made of canvas, but other than that, there is nothing else that resembles a two-person pup tent that I am used to while camping.
For starters, there is a small chandelier hanging down from the middle of the tent! Instead of a zipper opening, the doors are made of wood and huge glass panels, which allow for a clear view of the grazing antelope and zebra! We spent an entire afternoon sitting out on our tent’s patio watching the grazing cape buffalo, zebras, and impalas. On occasion, we saw rhinos and an elephant walking to the watering hole!
The floor of the luxury “tent” is carpeted, the closets are made of wood, and there is a king size mattress in the middle of the room. The tiled bathroom has two sinks and is about three times the size of our apartment bathroom! I’ve never gone camping and had electricity and wifi!
The camp grounds are very large, well maintained and full of luxury amenities. It is great for couples or families to relax by the pool after a long game drive. My favorite part about our stay was the food. For breakfast, lunch, and dinner, Sweetwaters Serena Camp had amazing buffets. There was even a wok station where we told the chef which foods we would like as he prepared it in front of us! We definitely did not leave Ol Pejeta hungry!
Lake Elmenteita
Our third stop was at Lake Elmenteita. This was possibly the most scenic and relaxing stop on our safari. We stayed at Lake Elmenteita Serena Camp, a sister camp to the one we stayed at in Ol Pejeta.
The room at this camp was huge and surrounded by golden-barked acacia trees. Every scene looked straight out of a movie. (I told Henry that I’m not a poet, but a few more days in this beautiful place and I might start a new career! :)
The camp itself had only a few tents, so it felt like we had the whole place to ourselves. The staff was very personable and the food was remarkable. Being a little over half way done with our trip, this was the perfect place to relax before our final stop in Maasai Mara.
The lake itself was surrounded by beautiful mountains and the lakeside was lined with thousands of flamingos! The entire water’s edge was just a sea of pink and white because it was covered with so many flamingos.
Em and I had never seen wild flamingos this close so we were blown away by getting to see thousands of these brilliant colored birds. And Henry told us that sometimes there can be a lot more than even what we saw!
We had the entire lake and game drive to ourselves. Behind us were dozens of zebras, impalas, and cape buffalo grazing in an open field. The entire scene looked so picturesque it didn’t seem real.
Lake Nakuru National Park
The next day we drove less than an hour down the road to Lake Nakuru National Park for another game drive. This park is well known for being the location for some of the scenes from the movie “Out of Africa.” It is easy to see why the movie chose this location to film. The lake is huge and surrounded with iconic looking acacia trees. There is also plenty of wildlife to see.
If I were an animal this is the place I’d want to live too! During our game drive we saw rhinos, giraffes, ostriches, zebras, cape buffalo, and thousands of more flamingos! All of the animals looked like they were standing in a painting next to the beautiful Lake Nakuru forest.
Our favorite sight was seeing a newborn cape buffalo walking with it’s herd. Henry told us that the baby was probably only a few hours old and was just learning to walk! He was so cute wobbling around trying to keep up with his mom and the rest of the herd!
On the way out of the park we saw a temperamental rhino charge after some other rhinos and cape buffalo. Fortunately for the rhinos and buffalos, the rhino’s eyesight is very poor and he lost interest in his charge very quickly. It was an amazing and funny scene to end our game drive in Lake Nakuru.
Maasai Experience
Henry surprised us with getting to spend the afternoon with an amazing group of Maasai people who work at Castel Mara Camp. The Maasai are one of the largest and best known ethnic groups in Africa. They currently live in Southern Kenya and Northern Tanzania. Historically, the Maasai were known as great warriors. In this region, boys used to have to kill a lion before they could be considered a man. (It’s safe to say that if I had single handedly kill a lion with a bow I would still be a boy to this day!) Today, Maasai are very focused on conservation and holding strong to their cultural traditions. We really enjoyed meeting new friends and spending the afternoon with them!
We knew that we were going to eat lunch at Castel Mara Camp, but had no idea that we would be singing, dancing, and jumping with local Maasai tribesmen! When we first arrived, we were greeted by the camp’s staff. After a few minutes of talking, we heard a loud yell come from around the corner followed by six Maasai men singing and dancing. Honestly, Em and I jumped quite a bit when we heard the first shout! They were trying to surprise us and they definitely succeeded! Before I knew it, the men grabbed our hands and had us join in the dancing and singing. One of the Maasai traditions is jumping as high as possible. The higher you jump, the more attractive you were to the females. The Maasai men had great vertical jumps that made me think they would be amazing basketball or volleyball players. (I on the other hand, probably would not be very attractive to the Maasai women due to my ankle high vertical jump ;)
We continued to sing and dance our way down to the forest where Castel Mara had an entire feast set up for us. The food was prepared by a local Maasai chef and was delicious. Although we had silverware, they encouraged us to practice the local tradition of eating with our hands. (A tradition that I would now like to adopt for all of my food :) It was an incredible experience and a great way to begin our time in Maasai Mara.
Castel Mara itself is a beautiful place to stay. Located just outside of the main Maasai Mara park entrance, the is regularly wildlife walking through the camp. The camp has five luxury tents that are well-furnished. It would be a perfect place to stay for couples or families. The staff was so friendly and welcomed us to come back and visit the next time we are in Kenya!
Maasai Mara
Possibly the crown jewel of Kenya National Parks is Maasai Mara. Located in the southwest of the country, the national park borders Tanzania’s Serengeti National Park. Maasai Mara isn’t just popular in Kenya, but is often listed as one of the best wildlife parks in all of Africa!
One of the most popular experiences in Maasai Mara is the great migration, where over a million wildebeest migrate from Tanzania to Kenya every year in July. Although we missed the migration by about a week, Maasai Mara definitely did not disappoint and was our favorite park we experienced.
Within about five minutes of entering the park, we spotted 10 lions sunning themselves by the side of the road! The one lion was lying about 10 feet away from us. It was amazing seeing such powerful animals up close. But little did we know that these were only the first of about 30 other lions we would see during our two-day Maasai Mara stay! We didn’t see any lions catching prey, but we did see one stalking an ostrich and another closely watching a herd of cape buffalo.
Pretty much any animal we could imagine, we saw at Maasai Mara. Elephants, giraffes, a leopard, cheetahs hippos, and so much more. One of my favorites was seeing four little cheetahs playing and chasing after their mom. This was also our first time seeing wild hippos and African crocodiles. I had no idea just how many hippos we would see right next to our camp! The only animal we didn’t see were rhinos, but we were thankful we got to see so many rhinos in Ol Pejeta.
Possibly our favorite lodging of our safari was at Mara Ngenche Safari Camp in Maasai Mara. Located right at the merger of Talek River and Mara River, Mara Ngenche camp is perfectly located. Right next to camp is one of the major crossing points for the great migration of wildebeest. The river is full of hippos and crocodiles!
For our safety at night, we had a local Maasai tribesman guard our tent from wild game. Any time we wanted to leave our tent during the night, we would signal for the guard. (I’m not sure how the Maasai guard would be safe with only having a wooden club for protection!) At night we heard hippos, hyenas, and even lions, so we were very thankful to know that someone was there to ward off any unwanted visitors in case they came too close!
The rooms were very private and had their own view of the Talek River. The “tents” were luxuriously furnished and had an outdoor shower and indoor bathtub! Like the other lodging we had during our safari, we definitely were not roughing it in Maasai Mara! The food was spectacular and served right next to the Mara River.
The first night, the staff arranged a sunset social (called a “sundowner” on safari) along the Mara River with the other guests staying in the camp. They offered an assortment of drinks and appetizers as we sat around a fire and watched giraffes grazing across the river.
One of the highlights of our trip came on our last morning game drive. Henry arranged with the camp for a private morning picnic breakfast in the middle of Maasai Mara. It seemed like a scene from out of a movie. He set up a wooden table and chairs under a lone acacia tree. We had a full breakfast with tea, bacon, sausage, eggs, potatoes, and bread! Looking out over the Mara savannah while eating a warm breakfast was the perfect way to wrap up our Kenyan safari.
We absolutely loved our time in Maasai Mara and we loved how – although every park was incredible – Henry planned the trip to save the best park for last!!
Giraffe Centre
Unfortunately, all good things must come to an end. For our last two days, we drove back to the capital city of Nairobi. For our final safari visit, we stopped by Giraffe Centre, home of the famous Giraffe Manor. This hotel is internationally recognized for its iconic pictures of giraffes eating out of the guests windows. Right next door to the hotel they have a giraffe center with about a dozen giraffes that you can feed and interact with. It really made us feel small standing next to the nearly 18 foot tall animals.
We learned that – although usually gentle – giraffes can be pretty impatient when it comes to feeding them food! Fortunately, the helpers showed us how to always have food ready so as not to accidentally be headbutted by the giraffes. (Although getting a black eye from a giraffe would have been an interesting way to end our time in Kenya!)
We spent our last night in Kenya back at Ole Sereni, the same hotel that we stayed at on our first night in Kenya. The hotel was very modern and a great way to begin and end our time in Kenya. It had an amazing breakfast and very comfortable beds. But the thing that we paid the most attention to were the impalas, cape buffalo, and ostrich we could see outside our bedroom window.
Although the hotel is located in Nairobi, one of the largest cities in Africa, it is also right across the highway from Nairobi National Park. This national park is home to pretty much every wild animal found in Kenya except for elephants. The morning after we arrived to Kenya, we had woken up so excited to tell our guide Henry about all the animals we saw only a couple hundred yards away! It is so funny looking back now at how excited we were over animals that we would later see by the hundreds!
Since seeing those animals had made us so excited to start our safari and see more wild animals, it was fun returning to Ole Sereni and remembering all that excitement during the start of our trip. We had never seen a wild animal before and were taking so many pictures and videos of an ostrich and impalas that were grazing across the highway in Nairobi National Park – and then two weeks later, seeing these incredible animals almost felt expected!
Even though we only knew him for 11 days, it was sad saying goodbye to Henry. It felt like we were saying goodbye to a lifelong friend. We hope that someday, whether in Kenya or the USA we will be able to see Henry again!
How to Book a Safari in Kenya
We never imagined that this 11 day safari would end up being our favorite trip of a lifetime! Capture Kenya Expeditions went above and beyond to make sure that it was the most amazing experience and created the best itinerary for a Kenya safari. We learned so much about Kenya, the local culture, and of course the wildlife! We weren’t safari advocates before, but we definitely are now! We highly recommend anyone thinking of planning their dream vacation to consider a safari in Kenya. In 11 days, we had so many amazing memories and new experiences and are so thankful we went! For more information about Capture Kenya Expeditions, read our full blog post about them or visit their website and send them a message to book!
