Kenya: Masai Mara, Lake Naivasha and Lake Nakuru for three generations

Arrive in Nairobi

Jomo Kenyatta International Airport to your hotel in Nairobi

• Welcome dinner at about 6 pm
• Nuit : Nairobi
• Environ 1 h de route

Soir

Then we sit down early, at about 6 pm, to a welcome dinner, with grilled nyama choma and simpler dishes for children who want them.

Compris

• Pick-up at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (NBO)
• Welcome briefing with your guide
• Welcome dinner

Baby elephants and giraffes

Nairobi to the Sheldrick Wildlife Trust nursery, then the Giraffe Centre in Langata

• Petit-déjeuner et repas du midi
• Nuit : Nairobi
• Environ 1 h de route

Matin

A slow breakfast, because this is a day for getting over the flight. Late in the morning we drive a short way into Nairobi National Park to the Sheldrick Wildlife Trust's elephant nursery for its one-hour public visit (currently 11 am to noon), when the keepers bring the orphaned calves out for their milk bottles and a mud bath and tell how each one was rescued. Children stand at the rope a few metres away, and grandparents can watch from the shade. Visits are booked ahead, and we do that for you.

Après-midi

Lunch is at a garden restaurant in Karen. In the afternoon we visit the Giraffe Centre in Langata, where the African Fund for Endangered Wildlife breeds Rothschild's giraffes, a rare subspecies, and you feed them from a raised platform at head height.

Soir

Then it is back to the hotel by mid-afternoon for the pool and an early night. Dinner is free, so each family can eat at the hotel when it suits.

Compris

• Sheldrick Wildlife Trust elephant nursery public visit
• Lunch in Karen
• Giraffe Centre, Langata

Activités en option

• Karen Blixen Museum, the farmhouse of the author of Out of Africa, a few minutes from the Giraffe Centre

Fly to the Masai Mara

Nairobi Wilson Airport to a Mara airstrip by light aircraft, then a conservancy camp

• Petit-déjeuner, repas du midi et repas du soir
• Nuit : Masai Mara
• Environ 30 min de route

Matin

After breakfast our driver takes us about 30 minutes to Wilson Airport, Nairobi's small-plane airport, with main bags left in store at the hotel. A scheduled light aircraft flies us to an airstrip in the Mara in about 45 to 60 minutes, sometimes with a stop at another strip on the way, and children usually have their faces to the window as the city gives way to farms and then open plains. The camp's guides meet the plane, and the short drive to camp is often a first game drive in itself. Our camp sits inside a conservancy bordering the Masai Mara National Reserve, on land leased from Maasai families, where the number of vehicles at a sighting is capped.

Après-midi

Lunch, then the middle of the day is for settling into the family tents and resting.

Soir

At about 4 pm we head out for the first drive, back at camp as the light goes, and dinner is early.

Compris

• Transfer to Wilson Airport
• Scheduled light-aircraft flight from Nairobi to the Masai Mara
• Lunch and dinner at camp
• Late-afternoon game drive in the conservancy
• Conservancy fees

A conservancy day at the family's pace

A full day in the Mara conservancy

• Petit-déjeuner, repas du midi et repas du soir
• Nuit : Masai Mara

Matin

Early risers go out on the dawn drive at about 6:30 am, when lions and hyenas are often still on the move, while anyone who wants to sleep in joins a second drive after breakfast. Conservancy rules let guides leave the track to follow an animal, so children see it close without a ring of vehicles round it. The middle of the day is for rest, a book on the veranda or the pool where the camp has one. In the late morning the camp's Maasai guides take older children and adults on a bush walk of up to two hours to read tracks and droppings, while younger children, who are usually too young for walks under camp rules, get a session close to camp on footprints, the plants herders use as medicine and beadwork.

Soir

After afternoon tea we go out again for the late drive and stop on a rise for a sundowner, with juice for the children, before an early dinner.

Compris

• Dawn or after-breakfast game drive in the conservancy
• Bush walk with Maasai guides for guests of 12 and up, or a camp-side session for younger children
• Late-afternoon game drive with a sundowner
• All meals at camp

Activités en option

• Hot-air balloon flight at sunrise with a bush breakfast, where the operator accepts children (price confirmed at booking)
• Night drive with a spotlight, where the conservancy allows it (price confirmed at booking)

Into the Masai Mara National Reserve

From the conservancy into the Masai Mara National Reserve and out to the Mara River

• Petit-déjeuner, repas du midi et repas du soir
• Nuit : Masai Mara

Matin

We leave after breakfast, at about 7:30 am, and work across the open grassland towards the Mara River, stopping wherever something is worth waiting for. The river holds hippos and large Nile crocodiles all year. From about July to October in most years the great herds of wildebeest and zebra are here from Tanzania's Serengeti, and some groups cross the river; when and where they cross changes daily, so a crossing is a chance, not a promise. Outside those months the reserve still has its resident lions, elephants, buffalo, cheetahs and plains game.

Après-midi

Lunch is a picnic in the shade near the river, and we are back at camp by about 2 pm, out of the afternoon heat, for a rest and the pool.

Soir

Those who want more stay out all day in a second vehicle and return at sunset.

Compris

• Half-day game drive in the Masai Mara National Reserve, reserve fee included
• The Mara River and its hippo pools
• Picnic lunch in the reserve
• Dinner at camp

Back over the Rift Valley to Lake Naivasha

Mara airstrip to Nairobi Wilson Airport by light aircraft, then the Rift Valley escarpment and Lake Naivasha

• Petit-déjeuner, repas du midi et repas du soir
• Nuit : Lake Naivasha
• Environ 2.5 h de route

Matin

A short last drive for anyone who wants it, then breakfast and the morning flight back to Wilson Airport, about 45 to 60 minutes. Our driver meets the plane with your main bags and we head north-west out of Nairobi on the A104, past the tea gardens around Limuru, to the edge of the Rift Valley escarpment. We stop at a viewpoint where the valley floor opens out far below, with the cone of Mount Longonot standing over the plain, then drop down to Lake Naivasha, about two and a half hours from Wilson with the stop.

Après-midi

Lunch is at our lodge on the shore, and the early afternoon is for the pool. At about 4 pm, when the heat has gone, a local boatman takes us out to watch the hippos at a safe distance, then lands us on Crescent Island, a private sanctuary with no large predators, where we walk among giraffes, zebras and wildebeest with a local guide.

Soir

Dinner at the lodge is early.

Compris

• Scheduled light-aircraft flight from the Masai Mara to Wilson Airport, Nairobi
• Rift Valley viewpoint on the escarpment
• Lunch and dinner at the lodge
• Boat trip on Lake Naivasha
• Guided walk on Crescent Island

Rhinos at Lake Nakuru, then the pool

Lake Naivasha to Lake Nakuru National Park and back

• Petit-déjeuner, repas du midi et repas du soir
• Nuit : Lake Naivasha
• Environ 3 h de route

Matin

We leave after breakfast at about 7:30 am and drive about an hour and a half north through Gilgil to Lake Nakuru National Park in our own vehicles, at most 6 guests in each, so every child has a window and can stand under the pop-up roof. The park was fenced in the 1980s as a sanctuary for rhinos, and it is one of the most reliable places in Kenya to see both black and white rhinos. Rothschild's giraffes, buffalo, waterbuck and big troops of olive baboons are common; lions are possible but never promised, and flamingo numbers swing widely since the lake rose.

Après-midi

We drive up to Baboon Cliff for the view over the whole lake, then head back to Naivasha for a late lunch at the lodge.

Soir

The afternoon is free for the pool, a nap or the lodge gardens, and the farewell dinner is early, at about 6 pm.

Compris

• Morning game drive in Lake Nakuru National Park, park fee included
• Baboon Cliff viewpoint
• Lunch at the lodge
• Farewell dinner

Activités en option

• Cycling through the gorge in Hell's Gate National Park in the afternoon, for older children and adults (price confirmed at booking)

Back to Nairobi and home

Lake Naivasha to Jomo Kenyatta International Airport

• Petit-déjeuner
• Environ 3 h de route

Matin

A slow breakfast by the lake, a last look at the hippos and the fish eagles, and time to repack. We leave the lodge at about 10:30 am and drive back up the escarpment and round the edge of Nairobi to Jomo Kenyatta International Airport, about 110 km and two and a half to three hours depending on traffic, with a stop on the way for a stretch and a snack. Your guide sees your family to the terminal and checks your flight before saying goodbye. Book a flight leaving after about 5 pm.

Soir

If yours leaves earlier, we start straight after an early breakfast, or arrange a transfer to a Nairobi hotel the night before on request. Families who want more time can add nights at the coast or in Nairobi; ask us when you book.

Compris

• Drop-off at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (NBO)