Itinerary
Day 1: Nairobi – Masai Mara National Reserve
(265 km, 5 – 6 hours)
Nairobi is your starting point; we will collect you from your hotel, residence, or the airport early in the morning. After introductions with your first guide of your trip you will head straight to one of the most well-known safari destinations in the world – the Masai Mara. Your journey weaves through the Great African Rift Valley, littered with volcanic debris and evidence of the violent geology that is still shaping this part of the world.
Once at the Masai Mara, you will make your way through the park and, with luck, get to sight some of the first wildlife of this two-week adventure you’re embarking on. Ranging across the lands are the big five of African safari, that is:
- Lions
- Buffalo
- Elephants
- Leopards
- Rhinos
So your chances of seeing them are very high. You’ll conclude this small drive with lunch at your selected camp or lodge. From here, you will head straight back out into the park and again take in the magnificent vistas and herds of wild animals.
As the sun hits the horizon you’ll be taken back to your accommodation for dinner and chance to rest ahead of a full day out on the plains the following day. The first day of your epic African safari includes:
- Accommodation at your camp or lodge
- Overnight stay inside Masai Mara Game Reserve
- Lunch and dinner, no breakfast
- Drinking water, other drinks are extra
HOTEL / LODGES OPTIONS Meals and overnight: on full booked: Lunch, Dinner & Breakfast
Day 2: Full day inside Masai Mara National Reserve
For your first full day on safari, the Masai Mara is an ideal place to start. Once you’ve had breakfast it’s out onto the acacia studded plains to take in all the nature these lands have to offer. Along with the big five, there are:
- Zebras
- Giraffes
- Crocodiles
- Hippos
- Baboons
And plenty more to keep you occupied throughout the day.
Your guide will be thoroughly experienced and able to help you look for the animals that are on your bucket list. The tour van comes equipped with a radio so you’re able to stay in touch with other groups who may spot the animals you’re looking for. The element of luck and the feel of an expedition across the grasses add a wonderful element of adventure to your safari.
Lunch will be served next to the Mara river as a picnic to make sure that every possible moment is spent surrounded by the flora and fauna of the Masai Mara. For dinner, you return to your chosen camp or lodge, where you will have chance to avail yourself of any extra facilities on offer. The first complete day on safari in Kenya includes:
- Accommodation at your camp or lodge
- Overnight stay inside Masai Mara Game Reserve
- Breakfast, lunch, and dinner
- Drinking water, other drinks are extra
HOTEL / LODGES OPTIONS Meals and overnight: on full booked: Lunch, Dinner & Breakfast
Day 3: Masai Mara National Reserve – Lake Nakuru National Park
(300 km, 5 – 6 hours)
Hearing the plains come to life as the first rays of light spill over the land is a magical thing to experience. Listening to the early calls of the animals across the grasses, the dawn chorus, is a wonderful start to the day. On this morning you will set out early to have chance to breathe in this feeling as nature awakens. After a calm morning watching the world come to life, you’ll head to your accommodation for breakfast and then depart to make your way north and east to Lake Nakuru.
Your path will weave you through the Great African Rift Valley and your guide will be able to stop occasionally at opportune locations for photos of the epic vistas that sprawl before you. As the lake comes into view you will notice the surface is many shades of pink; a million or more flamingos feed, dance, and display across these waters. After lunch at your selected camp or lodge you will get a full game drive, with chances to see the rare black and white rhinos, as well as more than 400 species of bird that flock here.
Following an afternoon of discovering a new landscape, and a different side to safari with birdwatching, you return to your accommodation for dinner and relaxation. The third day of your expedition across these lands includes:
- Accommodation at your camp or lodge
- Overnight stay inside Lake Nakuru National Park
- Breakfast, lunch, and dinner
- Drinking water, other drinks are extra
HOTEL / LODGES OPTIONS Meals and overnight: on full booked: Lunch, Dinner & Breakfast
Day 4: Lake Nakuru National Park – Amboseli National Park
(384 km, 6 – 7 hours)
Inside Lake Nakuru National Park is an area fenced off to provide extra protection for the rarest of animals that live in the park; the white and black rhinos and the Rothschild giraffe. After you’ve had breakfast and had your bags loaded into your vehicle you will head over to the area and have chance to see these great beasts of the plains. From here, it’s time to make your way to Amboseli.
Your eastward trail across Kenya will show you daily life in the countryside. You’ll pass by farms, villages, and towns with people going about their daily lives. You will have lunch en route, with traditional Kenyan food on offer and chance to spend a little time in a local town. Arrival in Amboseli will be late in the afternoon, as the sun begins to fall. Perhaps the most striking thing about Amboseli is the view of Mount Kilimanjaro, which you should first see this evening.
A brief game drive to your accommodation through the park gives you chance to see some of the wildlife as the plains begin to wind down for the day. Dinner will be served in the evening, and after a long drive across the country, you will have time to rest up and ready yourself for a packed day ahead. The fourth day of your safari in Kenya includes:
- Accommodation at your camp or lodge
- Overnight stay inside Amboseli National Park
- Breakfast, lunch, and dinner
- Drinking water, other drinks are extra
HOTEL / LODGES OPTIONS Meals and overnight: on full booked: Lunch, Dinner & Breakfast
Day 5: Full Day Inside Amboseli National Park
The highest peak in Africa, Mount Kilimanjaro, stands tall over Amboseli. The early morning offers the most spectacular views; before the clouds roll in for the day you can see the snow-capped peak drenched in early morning light. This time of day is perfect to see animals too, as they awake from their sleep filled with energy and ready to hunt or graze whilst the air is still cool.
As well as the big five of African safari, living in Amboseli are:
- Wildebeest
- Zebras
- Impalas
- Cheetahs
- Hyenas
Along with myriad other animals and birds that your guide will help you to spot and identify. This day in your journey also offers you a chance to visit a village of the Masai. These people have lived a nomadic life across these plains since time immemorial, and their ritual singing and dancing invites you into their community. You can see how their lives are lived and even get to see inside a house in the village. This special experience is optional and has a fee of $20 per person.
Giving you as much time as possible inside the park, lunch is served picnic style, whilst you return to your camp or lodge in the early evening for dinner. This special day of animal watching and lessons in humanity are rounded off by a quiet evening, where you can take advantage of terraces or picture windows at your accommodation to catch the nocturnal rhythm of Amboseli. This, your fifth day on African safari, includes:
- Accommodation at your camp or lodge
- Overnight stay inside Amboseli National Park
- Breakfast, lunch, and dinner
- Drinking water, other drinks are extra
HOTEL / LODGES OPTIONS Meals and overnight: on full booked: Lunch, Dinner & Breakfast
Day 6: Amboseli National Park – Namanga Boarder to Serengeti National Park
(518 km, 8 – 9 hours)
Another early start will take you out for dawn across Amboseli once more. With Kilimanjaro as your backdrop, you will be able to get some amazing photographs of the animals in front of the mountainscape. Once you’ve taken in the start of the day it’s time to have breakfast and head for the border.
Your crossing will be at Namanga Border, where you will complete your immigration process and continue your journey onwards to the Serengeti. There are many similarities between Kenya and Tanzania, with similar geography and nature. The differences are there to note and you will have time on this drive to see what makes each country special. As your first truly Tanzanian experience, lunch will be given to you as a picnic at a stop, where you can take in some of your first views across this new country.
Arrival in the Serengeti will be late afternoon and you’ll be able to catch the setting sun over the plains as you take a game drive through to your chosen accommodation. After a long day of travel and fresh adventure, you will have dinner and relaxation time. Many camps and lodges have terraces and viewing lounges, giving views over the plains and a chance to listen to the sounds of the night. Your first day on safari in Tanzania includes:
- Accommodation at your camp or lodge
- Overnight stay inside Serengeti National Park
- Breakfast, lunch, and dinner
- Drinking water, other drinks are extra
HOTEL / LODGES OPTIONS Meals and overnight: on full booked: Lunch, Dinner & Breakfast
- Katikati Tented Camp
- Acacia Central Camp
- Serengeti Serena Safari Lodge
- Acacia Seronera Luxury Camp
Day 7: Full Day inside Serengeti National Park
The Serengeti is part of a massive ecosystem that stretches across borders and includes the Masai Mara, where you will have already spent time marvelling at the nature. What sets the Serengeti apart is the diversity of environments, with forested and riverine areas which give a broad range of animals to learn about. You’ll head out on your journey of discovery after breakfast.
Along with the animals you’d expect to see in the Serengeti, there are rare species of antelope that live in the savannah:
- Dik-diks
- Klipspringers
- Bushbucks
- Fringe-eared oryxes
Which you can ask your guide to help you find. The rivers that run through the terrain host hippos, crocodile, and plenty of bird species for you to wonder at, also. Having lunch as a picnic in the park is the ideal way to get the most out of your game drive and be able to get deeper into the park.
Sunset sees you return to your accommodation. After a full day out in the plains its time for dinner and rest after completion of your first full week on safari in Africa. Included in the seventh day of your safari in Tanzania is:
- Accommodation at your camp or lodge
- Overnight stay inside Serengeti National Park
- Breakfast, lunch, and dinner
- Drinking water, other drinks are extra
HOTEL / LODGES OPTIONS Meals and overnight: on full booked: Lunch, Dinner & Breakfast
- Katikati Tented Camp
- Acacia Central Camp
- Serengeti Serena Safari Lodge
- Acacia Seronera Luxury Camp
Day 8: Serengeti National Park – Ngorongoro Conservation Area
(160 km, 3 – 4 hours)
Adjoining the Serengeti is the Ngorongoro Conservation Area that protects the lands of the impacted former volcano. After you have breakfast, your safari will take you down to these lands, with an optional stop at Olduvai Gorge on the way. Here, the archaeologist Dr Leakey discovered some of the earliest hominid bones known, and many thousands of some of the earliest tools that have ever been discovered. The importance of the human history is these lands is immense, and you can visit the museum at his laboratory to learn of his discoveries. As an optional activity, there is an additional fee of $45 per person for entrance to the site and museum.
As you continue to the area of the crater, lunch will once again be served as a picnic, out in the grasslands of the Serengeti. Every part of this journey offers chances to observe the wildlife, with the herbivores and predators knowing no bounds between the park boundaries.
You will stay at a camp or lodge or your choosing, either on the crater’s edge or the lands just outside. Once you arrive and settle into your room you can appreciate the views from terraces or indulge in spa treatments that may be on offer before having dinner. This day in your journey across East Africa includes:
- Accommodation at your camp or lodge
- Overnight stay inside Ngorongoro Conservation Area
- Breakfast, lunch, and dinner
- Drinking water, other drinks are extra
HOTEL / LODGES OPTIONS Meals and overnight: on full booked: Lunch, Dinner & Breakfast
- Ngorongoro Farm House
- The Castle at Ngorongoro
- Ngorongoro Serena Safari Lodge
- Acacia Farm Lodge
Day 9: Full Day Inside Ngorongoro crater
At over 19kms in diameter, below 600m-high natural walls, is an oasis of nature. Where once a massive volcano once sat, now there is a home to millions of mammals and birds. The Ngorongoro crater is where you’ll spend the full day, ascending down the rocky walls after breakfast at your camp or lodge.
In the crater, there are plenty of the mega-fauna that you’ve travelled so far to see, along with plenty of birds that flock to the area for the soda lake within. Birdwatchers can look out for:
- Ostriches
- Turtle doves
- Crowned lapwings
- Helmeted Guinea fowl
As well as flocks of fuchsia hued flamingos on the shores of the lake. Some of the few black rhinos left in Tanzania also roam the crater floor, and if you’re lucky your Tanzanian safari guide should be able to help you spot them.
As you sate your appetite for the wonders of nature, you can sate your need for sustenance with lunch as a picnic down inside the crater. For dinner, it’s back to your accommodation on, or just outside, the crater rim. On this day of your Tanzanian safari, included is:
- Accommodation at your camp or lodge
- Overnight stay inside Ngorongoro Conservation Area
- Breakfast, lunch, and dinner
- Drinking water, other drinks are extra
HOTEL / LODGES OPTIONS Meals and overnight: on full booked: Lunch, Dinner & Breakfast
- Ngorongoro Farm House
- The Castle at Ngorongoro
- Ngorongoro Serena Safari Lodge
- Acacia Farm Lodge
Day 10: Ngorongoro Concervation Area – Tarangire National Park
(191 km, 4 – 5 hours)
Rhinos like to take cover in the forests of the crater, so an early morning start with the dew still fresh on the grass is the best chance you will have to spot one with this wonderous scenery all around. Plenty of other animals will be about, hunting, grooming, and grazing, as you descend to the crater floor after an early breakfast. Your morning traversing the floor of the caldera finishes with a picnic before moving on to Tarangire.
The drive to the park takes you past Lake Manyara and into the plains of the park dotted with trees and greenery thanks to the river that gives this park its name. This area is famed for its many herds of elephants that range through the grasses and feed off the trees. As you arrive in the park, you will have chance to spot animals as you make your way to the camp or lodge you’ve selected.
After a long day, that will hopefully be packed with sightings of wildlife against beautiful backgrounds, you will have dinner at your accommodation. On the tenth day of your African safari adventure you will have included:
- Accommodation at your camp or lodge
- Overnight stay inside Tarangire National Park
- Breakfast, lunch, and dinner
- Drinking water, other drinks are extra
HOTEL / LODGES OPTIONS Meals and overnight: on full booked: Lunch, Dinner & Breakfast
- Lake Burunge Tented Lodge
- Acacia Tarangire Luxury Camp
- Tarangire Sopa Lodge
Day 11: Tarangire National Park – Arusha, fly to Entebbe
(120 km, 2 hours)
Head out into the park at daybreak, once you’ve had an early morning breakfast. This is your chance to explore the park again, with hopes of sighting:
- Lions
- Elephants
- Gerenuks
- Oryx
- Zebra
As well as many other animals that live here. Time at the swamplands should yield plentiful bird spotting moments; Tarangire has the highest number of breeding bird species in the world, with more than 550 species noted in the area.
Exploration of Tanragire over, it’s time to head over to the regional capital of Arusha and take your flight to the third country on your itinerary. Two hours by plane takes you to the capital of Uganda, Kampala on the shores of Lake Victoria. Your arrival is late afternoon and you’ll be collected from the airport by your Ugandan safari guide who will take you to you chosen hotel in the city. Take some time to explore the city on foot, visiting local craft markets and taking in the hustle and bustle of this former colonial city.
Lunch will come during your travels and you can have dinner at your hotel as your first experience of Ugandan food. Rest up, for your travels to the mountain gorilla will be long and tiring, yet immensely rewarding. This, the eleventh day of your African safari includes:
- Accommodation at your Kampala hotel
- Breakfast, lunch, and dinner
- Drinking water, other drinks are extra
HOTEL / LODGES OPTIONS Meals and overnight: on full booked: Lunch, Dinner & Breakfast
Day 12: Kampala – Bwindi Impenetrable National Park
(494 km, 8 – 9 hours)
The countryside of Uganda is markedly different to what you’ll have gotten used to in Kenya and Tanzania, your exploration begins after breakfast in your hotel. Here, the land is greener and more forested and you’re at a higher elevation. Your journey to Bwindi Impenetrable Forest will weave you through the terrain, including a chance to stop at the equator for a photo opportunity.
Lunch is served in the town of Mbarara, a typical Ugandan town where you can begin to acclimatise as you ascend towards to mountains. Here, you’re in the tropics rather than the arid grasses of the savanna in Tanzania or Kenya. Volcanic mountains are covered in dense, green forests that are home to some of the most diverse ecosystems on the planet. You will make a stop to view the peaks of Virunga volcano that sits over the border in Rwanda; with luck you’ll be treating to the awesome cloud formations that sometimes top the pinnacles.
By late afternoon you drop into the valley and come to the edges of Bwindi Impenetrable Forest. This dense and diverse rainforest can only be navigated on foot and is home to some of the last mountain gorillas in the world. You’ll have dinner and spend your evening taking in the sights, sounds, and smells of this unique habitat. Your first full day on safari in Uganda includes:
- Accommodation at your camp or lodge
- Breakfast, lunch, and dinner
- Drinking water, other drinks are extra
HOTEL / LODGES OPTIONS Meals and overnight: on full booked: Lunch, Dinner & Breakfast
- Buhoma Lodge
- Engagi Lodge
- Volcanoes Bwindi Lodge
Day 13: Full Day inside Bwindi Impenetrable National Park
The mountain gorillas that live in Bwindi make up half of the world’s population of this awe-inspiring great ape. This is the day you will get to spend time with one of the families in the park, so be up early for breakfast and an important briefing by a park ranger about safety for you and the gorillas. Trekking through the dense forest requires a decent level of fitness and good quality hiking boots; you’re on the move for anything from 30 minutes to 5 hours each way!
Once you make it on site, you’re rewarded with the chance to observe the gorillas. You can get an understanding of their social structures, routines, and habits as you watch them gather food, groom, and build their nests. With so few of these gorillas left, this is your opportunity to come face-to-face with them and your presence is a bolster to the conservation efforts of the national park.
Keep up the excitement with a guided walking safari of the Munyanga River trail in the afternoon, if you’ve got the energy to spend more time in this humid and challenging terrain. These forests have over 1000 plant species and is home to thousands of mammals, birds, insects, and lizards to discover. As well as the wildlife on offer, the trail will also reveal three waterfalls for swimming and photoshoots.
Your lunch and dinner are served at your accommodation and the evening gives you a well-deserved rest following your long and hot day in the rainforest. The final full day of your Ugandan safari includes:
- Accommodation at your camp or lodge
- Breakfast, lunch, and dinner
- Drinking water, other drinks are extra
HOTEL / LODGES OPTIONS Meals and overnight: on full booked: Lunch, Dinner & Breakfast
- Buhoma Lodge
- Engagi Lodge
- Volcanoes Bwindi Lodge
Day 14: Bwindi Impenetrable National Park – Kampala, to Nairobi by Plane
(494 km, 9 hours driving, 2 hours flying)
Start the return leg of your journey with an early breakfast before heading to the airport outside of Kampala. There will still be plenty of nature to take in along the way, including passing through the highlands, fondly known as the “Switzerland of Uganda”. Lunch will once again be offered in a town en route.
The obvious place to fly to from Entebbe airport is Nairobi to catch international connections, but you can choose to fly on to a different location depending on your onwards plans. Be sure to discuss this on booking to ensure flight and transfer times will synchronise. This final day of your three-country safari of east Africa includes:
- No accommodation, this is the final day
- Breakfast and lunch, no dinner
- Drinking water, other drinks are extra
