Welcome to the grand finale of this series on Kenya! Unfortunately, my big nice camera met its untimely demise in the previous article at Lake Nakuru. So this article—which would have included some of the coolest photos I’d ever have taken—unfortunately, will be brought to you from my iPhone.
Before we get into this, a few practical notes:
Our Safari Operator:
Our safari operator for both safaris was Matizamo Safaris. Incredibly, they do not have a website, but they came recommended through a personal connection of our group. Here’s their contact info. They were really great. I’d definitely recommend them. We felt safe and well-taken care of the whole way through this trip.
P.O. Box 46538-00100, Nairobi, Kenya
Cell: +254 701088256 (Kenya)
info@matizamosafaris.com
Our Accomodations Inside Maasai Mara:
Inside the Maasai Mara reserve, we stayed at a place called Ashil Mara Camp, which was great. I’ve honestly never stayed anywhere quite like it! Our rooms were tents… or at least, half of them were tents. It was like the foundation and flooring of a house had been completed with wooden beams and tent flaps. The bathrooms were actually amazing! And aside from the odd gecko that managed to find its way into the “tent”, they managed to keep us quite well insulated from bugs without sacrificing much of the tent experience. At night, the sounds of the Mara filled the tents, providing the best sleep ambience I think I’ve ever experienced. However, the gentle rustling of leaves in the wind and constant hum of bugs is occasionally interrupted by the sounds of BIG animals. Being close to a river, we heard a lot of hippo sounds in the night, which might seem a bit unsettling, but there’s actually no reason to worry. I’ll tell you why in the next section…
An Intro Maasai Mara
(And How It Relates to the Serengeti)
Maasai Mara—which is often locally referred to as simply, “The Mara”—is the name of a giant nature preserve in southwest Kenya. Its namesake, the Mara River, runs through it, and the word “Maasai” refers to the original tribal inhabitants of this area, who can still be found here today.
You may not have heard of this place, but I’m willing to bet you’ve heard of the Serengeti. You’ve heard the Africa by Toto, right? References to the Serengeti are everywhere in pop culture.
Well, as far as I know, the only difference between Maasai Mara and the Serengeti is the border between Kenya and Tanzania. The Mara is the Kenyan side, while the Serengeti is the Tanzanian side. You can see this relationship on the map below.
Looking at the map, it might be tempting to think that Maasai Mara is the lesser of the two experiences because it’s so much smaller than the Serengeti, but—while I have not personally experienced both—I’m told this is not the case. Let me share with you a few facts that might persuade you to choose Maasai Mara over the Serengeti for your next safari:
Maasai Mara is still really big. And do you really think anybody is going to see ALL of the Serengeti? Unlikely.
In the Serengeti, there are laws that prohibit safari vehicles from driving off-road. This means that, if you see an animal up close, it will be because the animal just so happened to get really close to the road. Meanwhile, in Maasai Mara, there are no rules about off-roading. If you see something you want to get closer to, the only thing holding you (and your driver) back is the physical terrain. For this reason, I’m told that a lot of the Nat Geo footage collected from this region of the world comes not from the Serengeti, but from Maasai Mara. They are basically the same area, and camera crews need to get close to the animals!
In the Serengeti, the laws reflect an attitude that the land belongs not to the people, but to the animals. That sounds very nice, until you find out that this means that there are no fences permitted anywhere in the Serengeti. So, remember how I said that you didn’t need to worry about the nearby hippos when you were safe in your tent in Maasai Mara? That’s because there are giant fences around the camp to keep out the big game. In the Serengeti, there will be no such fences around your tents. All that will seperate you from lions and hyenas are your tent flaps. I’ve heard that there are similar dynamics in other neighboring countries, such as Botswana. That being said, people still go on fence-free safaris and are (almost) always fine! But for my first time… yeah, Maasai Mara 100%.
Sunrise on the African Savanna
+Casual Ostrich Sighting
The best times to see wildlife in Maasai Mara are at sunrise and sunset. This is convenient too, because it also makes for the most dramatic views! During the day, you could be forgiven if you thought that Maasai Mara was just a big field. But during sunrise and sunset… this place is absolutely magical, not just because it is bursting with life, but also because of the colors of the sky and the way those colors interact with the windswept grassy terrain…
So your typical safari schedule includes early morning call-times, and mid-day siestas. Which is pretty much the way I travel anyway.
I’m going to condense the 2 days we had in Maasai Mara into 1 day, and arrange the pictures more or less by time of day. So we’ll start with sunrise, and move toward sunset (skipping the mid-day siesta, of course).
On our first morning, under the purple hues of the Maasai sunrise, we began seeing wildlife even before the sun had breached the horizon line. Off in the distance, we spotted a couple of giraffe, gently grazing on some high-up tree leaves. And while we would ultimately arrive at a giant pride of lions, the most surreal sighting from this early morning time was a lone ostrich that was walking down the middle of the road for a ways. Eventually it took a right turn and headed off into the grasslands, but it remained visible even from a long distance away. These are BIG animals.
For me, an odd theme through all of Maasai Mara was just how surreal it was to see these animals in their natural habitat; in their place of origination. I had gotten so used to seeing images of lions, giraffes, elephants, ostriches, etc on TV or in zoos—completely out of context—that my concept of them felt a bit divorced from that context. Being here was the first time I really began to internalize that this ecosystem is not just something out of a book, but REAL—and these animals belong in it! It might seem obvious, but seeing these places in real life is entirely different in reality than in theory. It’s easy to see why the images of this place loom so large in our collective imagination. Honestly, when I think back on Maasai Mara, it still feels surreal to me that this place exists in real life. It felt a bit like a dream.
Now let’s move on to the main event of the morning: the pride of lions…
(Almost) Seeing A Pride of Lions Attack a Herd of Buffalo
The Holy Grail of safaris is seeing a pride of lions attack and kill something. Some of our friends that had been with us in Nairobi had actually done this same trip about a week before, and they had seen the lions in full hunting action. The pictures were INSANE.
The safari guides know this, and will do their best to get you front row seats to the big show. The problem is, there’s no guarantee that they’ll be able to catch the lions in action. They have a really good knowledge of where each pride of lions tends to hang out, what their hunting patterns are, and how to position their vehicles in anticipation of where the action will be… but after that, all they can do is park the car in the right place and wait.
Unfortunately, every guide is working with more or less the same set of information. And they will actively be in contact with one another throughout these drives, so if something is happening, everybody can come watch. The result is that every safari vehicle within a 5 mile radius will sort of converge on a single point and create mini-traffic jams following the prides of lions around. It’s actually really annoying, until you remember that “you’re not IN traffic, you ARE traffic.” So I guess I have no right to complain about this.
So, as the sun rose higher in the sky and temperature steadily rose, the caravan of safari vehicles got into position to (hopefully) see some blood and guts. Off in the distance there was a big herd of buffalo. The pride of lions silently sauntered into stealth positions, staying low in the high grass as to be almost invisible. Little by little, the pride began to position itself on either side of the heard of buffalo in a pincher formation.
Of course, the herd of buffalo was moving too, as they lazily grazed. At some point, a couple of the leading female lions grew bolder, sneaking up close to the herd in a “cat-ready-to-pounce” stance. At this point, some of the larger buffalos seemed to sense that something was up. With some telling grunts to alert the rest of the herd, a couple of them ventured out from the pack, staring intently into the horizon. It was like a game of chess. The lions stayed crouched low in the grass. It was unclear if the buffalos knew for certain what or where the threat was, but the two groups held their positions in total stillness, looking vaguely and threateningly in each other’s directions. I was really shocked at how much tension I felt in these moments; I was on the edge of my seat! This was INTENSE! You really felt like war could break out at any moment! I bet this is how the aliens felt watching the Cold War.
Eventually, the herd of buffalo repositioned itself a bit further from the lions, and the pride of lions seemed to lose interest. At least temporarily. Slowly the tension eased, and it became clear that we would not bear witness to any Nat Geo-style carnage today. This is why people spend more than just a couple of days out here. If you want to see the action, it might take a few days. Here are a few crappy iPhone pictures from the encounter. They don’t capture the intensity of the moment at all, but they do capture the line of safari vehicles parked like they are at a drive-in movie theater.
Cheetah Sighting
Oh man that was intense. MOVING ON.
To me, one of the coolest sightings we had out here was a lone cheetah, who was just laying around in the grasslands. When laying down in the grass, it’s almost invisible. I was shocked that anybody in our crew even noticed it! But we pulled up relatively close to it, and sat there for a while, in quite observation. It didn’t do much during that time, but still… how cool is that? This is a cheetah. Out in the wild.
Elephant Sightings
Did anybody ever watch The Wild Thornberrys Movie? This is perhaps a deep cut from life as a 1990s/2000s kid, but I was thinking about that movie while we were out here. The juxtaposition between rainy London and this beautiful place. It was the elephants that really brought to mind this association.
We saw lots of elephants throughout our time in The Mara. Sometimes they were from a distance, but there were a couple of instances where we found ourselves up close and personal with a whole group of them. Random fact: a group of elephants is called a “collective.” I will definitely not be using this terminology in my writing. 😂
Giraffe Sightings
Giraffes were another common sighting out here. Although, they were not as easy to spot as you might assume! These gentle giants are usually in clusters of trees and actually blend in really well—although, a bit less well than usual during our visit, as Maasai Mara was unusually thanks to recent rainfall. In fact, just a week prior to our trip, much of Kenya—including Maasai Mara—had suffering a severe bout of flooding. We were a bit nervous before coming here reading headlines like this:
Kenya floods: tourists evacuated from Maasai Mara after river bursts banks
Flooding in a Kenyan Natural Reserve Forces Tourist Evacuation
Oh hey climate change. 👋 Fancy seeing you here.
Anyway, remember this—this context will matter at the end of this article. #foreshadowing. But for now, I’m just telling you so that you know why the pictures I’m showing you are so incredibly verdant. (That’s a fancy way of saying “green”). Normally, giraffes’ yellow-brown color scheme allow them to blend in much better than what you are seeing here.
At this point, I was getting pretty frustrated with my lack of camera.
But ya know what they say: “necessity is the mother of invention.”
So I MacGyver’d myself a make-shift zoom lens by putting my iPhone up to a pair of binoculars. It was a bit tricky to line up the shots right—definitely not a long term solution—but the results were kinda cool…
Other Sightings
Hippos, Crocodiles, Jackyls, Eagles, Wildebeest, Mongooses (Mongeese?), and more!
I could go on and on about all the different animals that we saw out here. But without good pictures of them to show you, I don’t think the juice is worth the squeeze. Suffice to say, there is a lot of life out here.
For me, the most unexpectedly cool sighting out here were the jackyls. They are like cute little coyotes running around the savanna. We stopped for them on multiple occasions, and each time I couldn’t help but think that they would make great pets. I think the same thing about foxes when I see them in the wild. How cool.
Crossing Into Tanzania 🇹🇿
So remember how we talked about the fact that Maasai Mara and the Serengeti are basically the same place, separated by the Kenyan/Tanzanian border? Well, we crossed that border. By a few miles I think! We were driving for a while until we finally stopped at a river where we found a man in army fatigues with a machine gun. That was definitely NOT in my top-10 things I wanted to encounter in my trip to Africa, but he was nice. He actually took a goofy picture with a few of us, him holding his gun, us holding our beers.
Anyway, at this river, we got out and spent some time on foot. After tromping through the muddy brush for a little while, we came to an outlook point where we could see a whole bunch of crocodiles laying on the shore just a stone’s throw away from us. And on the far bank of the river (and in the middle of the river), we saw a group of hippos enjoying the cool flow of the water. Yep, these are two large and dangerous animals! And there we were, pointing and waving from the bushes. Luckily, we never had to find out which of us was the slowest runner of our group.
So, here’s the big question: does this mean that I can say that I’ve been to Tanzania now? Should I make a Tanzania page for this website populated with only this article? Let me know in the comments! 😂
Sunset on the Savannah
+ Hyenas Galore!
Now it’s time for sunset! By this point, we had already seen a lot of profoundly cool and beautiful things, but to me, the coolest part is what happens at sunset. Driving through the savanna, when the light really begins to fade and the darkness of night first begins to extend its long, sinewy fingers over this landscape, suddenly hyenas begin to appear everywhere. It’s simultaneously amazing and terrifying. It’s possible that I’ve got some ghoulish associations with them from their role in the Lion King…
…but they are genuinely quite intimidating! And seeing them suddenly materialize out of every bush in sight was a really dramatic and cool sight! Of course, it would have been a whole lot less cool if I had not been viewing this from the safety of our landcruiser—but from my vantage point looking out of the open roof of our vehicle, this was an exciting sight to behold. Here are a couple of pictures I snapped before the light was completely gone. The aura of these hyenas only grew stronger as the light vanished. In the blackness of the night, catching sight of one of these things out here with the car headlights felt like something out of Blair Witch Project.
The coolness/creepiness of hyenas aside, we were actually blessed with some absolutely breathtaking sunsets during this trip. We even got a dramatic rainbow at one point, as the rains from the previous week had not completely subsided yet. These photos would have been even better with my REAL camera, but even though my iPhone, they are still quite dramatic. And one up-side to only having my phone is that I begrudgingly returned to a medium that I had long since abandoned: video. Below this gallery you’ll find the first video I have posted since Cuba! I’m no videographer, but hopefully it gives you a better taste for this place.
That video of us speeding through the darkened savanna of Maasai Mara ends with us eventually reaching Ashnil Mara Camp, where a large dinner and a fire pit awaited us. Oh, and the staff had also set up a TV to watch the Premier League. I love how international soccer/football is. If you get into it, you’ve got something to talk about with people in every country.
This chapter in Maasai Mara, in Kenya, and indeed, in Subsaharan Africa—which was a new region for me & this blog—is now coming to a close. While I was immeasurably disappointed not to have had my camera by my side, the experience may have been all the more beautiful for its absence. Sometimes I’m so worried about making sure I can remember things like this, that I forget to experience them in the first place. Maasai Mara was definitely a place where I was present. Which was good, because there were some unpleasant things that awaited me when I got back to London. At least I got to have this.
Luckily, there was one other guy in our group that had an actual nice camera, so I can give you a taste of what this would have looked like in HD. Big shoutout to Ranghao for sharing some of his photographs with me. 👋😘
Epilogue: Escape From Maasai Mara!
You remember all the flooding I mentioned earlier in this article right?
Well, during dinner on our last night, the rains returned. IN FORCE.
I want to say that I’ve seen it rain harder than this before… but I really can’t remember when. This was at least tied for the most intense rain I’ve ever seen, if not clinching the top spot. It would have been a bit scary if it wasn’t also kind of fun to observe from the shelter of our dining area. It got a bit less fun though when our guide gathered us around to gave us a debrief of what to expect the following day, which she was forced to YELL over the roar of the storm.
Basically, she was talking through all of the ways that this rain could trap us in the Mara, and what we would do in each potential situation. The basic upshot was that we would have to get a very early start the next day to maximize our chances of getting back to Nairobi in time to catch our flights, as there were sure to be places where rivers had risen to engulf roads that might force to us back-track and re-route, which might take hours, depending on road condition. It was a sobering note to end on, as we all ran back to our rooms through the rain. The rain made for an incredible sleep soundscape though.
The next morning, the rains had stopped, but our adventure was just beginning. We loaded into the landcruisers and got moving as early as possible. The landscape was absolutely drenched from the torrential rains the night before, but save for a few instances of off-roading to avoid particularly muddy stretches of roads, things seemed to be going pretty well in the beginning.
To our surprise and amusement, there was a hot air balloon in the distance that was attempting to proceed with its regularly scheduled itinerary despite the inclement conditions. In the distance, from the vantage of the windows of our moving vehicle, we watched the flame ignite, sending the balloon briefly into the air, only for it to come back down a few hundred meters away. It was awkwardly hopping across the savanna like this, never able to fully take flight.
And then, it suddenly became clear that there was a real risk of the balloon coming down right on top of us, or on top of the road at least. “…no way…” an audible, amused murmur went through our jeep as we watched the balloon come down EXACTLY on the road in front of us. I mean really—what are the odds of that? We had to drive off-road to get around this thing. 😂
Moving on from that unlikely convergence, we would soon encounter a low bridge where the stream it traversed had grown to be a full-on river, submerging the bridge completely. So we were forced to re-route, and this is where the trouble began. An hour of muddy roads later, and we came across a semi-truck that was completely stuck in the mud in the middle of the road. Setting aside the mystery of why a fucking semi-truck was out here in the first place, let alone under these easily foreseeable conditions, our little caravan was forced to shoot the the narrow gap between this giant truck and the opposite boundary of the drivable road. The first landcruiser in our caravan made it through! The second landcruiser (the one I was in) was not so lucky. It sank deep into the mud, prompting what felt like hours of effort on the part of our guides to get these vehicles across.
This must have been one of the only passable roads out of the Mara, because there was a bit of a queue forming. After one vehicle managed to free itself from the mud, the next one would get a running start, gunning-it toward the mud pit in hopes of momentum carrying it through to the other side. Most did not make it, forcing this saga to play out over and over again.
Reactions to this situation largely split along gender lines, with the women waiting patiently for the situation to be resolved, while the men lined up along the side of the road offering suggestions of what our guides should do to these vehicles un-stuck, and exchanging stories of times that they had had to get a car un-stuck from the mud or snow in the past.
“I love this! I froth on this shit!” one of my male counter-parts exclaimed as we watched our jeep sink deeper into the muck.
Things took on a slightly more serious tone when, it turned out that there were a few HIPPOS walking around in the space between the vehicles that had made it safely across this stretch of mud, and those that were still stuck.
If you don’t know, hippos are really dangerous—much more so than lions, or any of the more carnivorous animals out here. According to the BBC, they are the most deadly animal out here, causing an estimated 500 deaths per year, while lions only cause about 22. Our group had been walking freely back and forth between the stuck and un-stuck cars, but we had to be a bit more careful after that.
Thankfully the hippos eventually moved on and nobody was hurt, but it’s very easy to imagine how this could have been a much worse morning.
EVENTUALLY, all of the vehicles made it through the mud, escaped from the the Mara and got onto a paved road… but I think it took us almost 4 hours in total.
And, luckily, no flights were missed.
By the time I got to the airport for my flight back to London, I felt like I had lived a whole life. From cruising altitude in the quiet dark of my British Airways flight, heading north over the Sahara, it was crazy to think that I had started this morning in Maasai Mara.
That concludes my/our first forray into Sub-Saharan Africa!
Contemplating your first trip to this region is really quite intimidating. There’s a big mental hurdle to coming here for the first time, but now that I’ve jumped over that hurdle, suddenly it feels like a whole new world of possibilities has opened up for me. Travel-wise, things feel possible here! And even as I was leaving, I was already thinking about other places in Sub-Saharan Africa that I could travel to next. South Africa is the obvious one, but Uganda, Tanzania, Nigeria, Ghana, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Namibia… these are all supposed to be incredible (and relatively safe) places to visit. Makes you think…
I’ll be coming back here, for sure.
But for now, back to Europe.
