6 Days Masai Mara, Lake Nakuru & Amboseli-Ultimate Kenyan Safari

Pickup from hotel was smooth and on time, communication via WhatsApp. George the driver and guide with more than 20 years experience really made the trip memorable. He knew where to spot wildlife before other vehicles did. The first full day in the Mara, 4 of the Big 5 were seen due to his expertise. Glad I booked the jeep, very roomy and the best option for the rugged terrain. All lodges visited were great, food was buffet style., accommodations comfortable. Thanks again George.

Fantastic experience all round. The trip was extremely easy, and didn’t require any organisation from us once we’d met up with our guide, who took us to all the parks and pre booked accommodation without us having to do anything. The accommodations were very pleasant, and the vehicle was comfortable for long rides. Most importantly however, the safari was incredible. Our driver (Patrick) was extremely knowledgeable about the wildlife, and was able to anticipate where they’d go next. He helped us identify and spot every animal we could think of, and we got excellent views as a result of his expert knowledge of the parks. Everyone we dealt with from the company was a fantastic representative of their company, and we had a wonderful time. I would 100% recommend people to book this.

We were completely happy with every aspect of our safari. Our guide, David, was very knowledgeable about the wildlife and was always eager to impart that information to us. He is the guides’ guide as he often told other drivers where to go look for the animals. I’m so amazed how he can spot an animal hidden far away as he drove. He’d stop and tell us where to look and sometimes it took us 10-15 minutes with binoculars to find the animal. He’d go to any length possible to make our adventure the best possible one. He also knows how animals behave and will park at a spot where he knows the animal will walk towards. He’ll beat other drivers to getting the best viewing spot. Also he’ll park where you’ll get the best angle photographically and tell you if a video would be better and he’s right. Originally we booked a minivan but upgraded to a Land Cruiser and were glad we did. About 90% of the safari vehicles in Maasai Mara and Amboselli National Parks were Land Cruisers. We used an open top minivan with another operator in Nairobi national park and got stuck in wet mud on one section. We had to wait until another vehicle came by to use a bungee cord to pull our minivan out. Land Cruisers with their four wheel drive are much less likely to get stuck and the seating is more spacious then the minivans. We also upgraded to a private safari which is good because we can tell David however long we want to stay at any given viewing spot. Often the drives are hours long and one time after eating something bad I had to tell David to pull over so I could use a “bush toilet.” I would have been embarrassed if I had to do so with a shared safari packed with strangers. We were wary about doing the optional Lake Nakuru 2 hour combo boat ride and nature walk after reading reviews. But we were glad we did. You can see hippos much closer on the boat and you can walk to about 20 feet from some of the wildlife. We did the optional Massai village tour and it was interesting to see and learn how they live. However, we did have a bad taste at the end when we were led into their market area where we were subject to overly aggressive sales tactics for souvenirs vastly overpriced by multiples over what you can pay anywhere else for the exact same items. We help support the massai with the “donation” fee for admission on the front end and to subject their guests to a rude ending doesn’t really help their cause in the long run. Then again, the massai aren’t known for being good business people. Neither the Maasai village, boat/nature walk or balloon excursions had anything to do with Wild Adventures. They just dropped us off at those places if we wanted to do those excursions and we paid those places without Wild Adventures being a middleman. When we went in the first week of October we saw herds of wildebeast in the Masai but none were crossing the river so we missed the Great Migration. We did the balloon ride over Amboselli which lasted about 1.25 hours at $450 per person. It was ok, but we didn’t see too many animals and the view of mt Kilimanjaro was not much different from 500 feet up. Personally I thought the balloon went too high because the few animals we saw were too small and far away. I’d rather see animals from just above tree height, which I’m told is often the case at the massai Mara balloon ride. We upgraded to the Sentrim chain lodgings and they were clean and comfortable. They consist of single rustic bungalow buildings. The food was buffet style and tasty with a decent variety. I did get an upset stomach but neither my two family members nor David did so go figure. Wild Adventures provided ample water during the game drives and the lodgings put a 500 ml bottle for each guest in the room, which we used to brush our teeth as tap is not completely potable. One of the sentrim properties only had electricity available from 5-7 am and 6-10 pm so overnight charging wasn’t available. When the electricity shuts off at 10 pm don't forget to put the light switch into the off position or at 5 am the lights will come back on when the electricity returns. Not all sentrim properties had outlets compatible with US plugs so we still needed our adapters sometimes. All the lodgings had hot showers and flushing toilets. We highly recommend using Explorers wild Adventures as they are a professionally run operation geared to high client satisfaction.