Masai Mara - Amboseli - Lumo

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Aufgenommene Bilder auf unser­er Reis­eroute zum Jahreswech­sel 2021/22

How everything began

Our last Africa safari was near­ly 3 years ago now. A lot had been going on in the mean­time. The world almost stood still because of the Coro­na pan­dem­ic. Trav­el­ing - espe­cial­ly long-dis­tance trav­el - was out of the ques­tion for a long time. In addi­tion, I changed my job again - hope­ful­ly for the last time - at the end of 2020.

Despite all this, how­ev­er, the Africa virus nev­er gave us a break. After the Coro­na sit­u­a­tion seemed to sta­bi­lize some­what in the sum­mer of 2021, we start­ed plan­ning a new trip. We quick­ly decid­ed to go to Kenya again, which in our opin­ion was one of the best coun­tries to deal with the Coro­na pan­dem­ic on the African con­ti­nent. Since our last safari trip at the turn of the year 2018/2019 in the Masai Mara remained unfor­get­table in our mem­o­ries, we want­ed to enjoy this there again.

Reports about our pre­vi­ous Africa trips as well as gen­er­al safari tips can also be found here on this website.

The travel group

Our friends Andrea and Har­ry were also quick­ly enthu­si­as­tic about the project, so that we: my wife Simone, my daugh­ter Luise, our friends Andrea and Har­ry and me start­ed the detailed plan­ning in August 2021.

Travel planning

We want­ed to spend New Year’s Eve 2021 again in the Masai Mara at the Mara Bush Camp - Pri­vate Wing. This part of the trip was quick­ly decid­ed. The fur­ther con­crete plan­ning then took place in the proven man­ner by e-mail with Mr. Nowak of Let’s go Africa, with whom we had already planned all our pre­vi­ous Africa trips.

Due to our avail­able vaca­tion days and the flight sched­ules, the days from Decem­ber the 26th, 2021 to Jan­u­ary the 7th, 2022 were final­ly avail­able for our trip. In the end we decid­ed to start with a 5-day stay at the Mara Bush Camp - Pri­vate Wing in the Masai Mara (which would be our 5th stay there).

After that, we want­ed to make a third attempt at Amboseli Nation­al Park to see Mount Kil­i­man­jaro and final­ly take THE arche­typ­al safari pho­to: Ele­phants in front of the Kilimanjaro.

To save time, we would fly there from the Masai Mara on a domes­tic flight and stay two nights. We have been to Amboseli Nation­al Park twice before, in July 2015 and August 2017, and each time we could only glimpse the majes­tic moun­tain behind clouds.

(Spoil­er: This time we should have much more luck…)

The third and for us com­plete­ly new loca­tion had then been warm­ly rec­om­mend­ed to us by Mr. Nowak. The part­ner com­pa­ny of Let’s go Africa in Kenya, Sun­world Safaris, had short­ly before acquired a new pri­vate con­ser­van­cy, the Lumo Con­ser­van­cy in the Tsa­vo West area. We had nev­er been to the Tsa­vo area before, which is espe­cial­ly known for its red ele­phants. So we want­ed to fin­ish our trip there in the com­fort­able Lions Bluff Lodge.

In Africa, we would again have our own safari vehi­cle with dri­ver and guide for the entire trip. We were espe­cial­ly hap­py that Caleb would be our guide again, who had already accom­pa­nied us very com­pe­tent­ly twice before.

Thus, the trav­el sequence was fixed and we start­ed with the con­crete prepa­ra­tions. First, we booked the trip with Let’s go Africa and the flights with Lufthansa. This time we were able to apply for the visas direct­ly in Kenya via eVisa online, which worked wonderfully.

Due to the strong increase in Coro­na num­bers in the fall of 2021 and in par­tic­u­lar due to the much more infec­tious Omikron vari­ant detect­ed for the first time in South Africa, it was uncer­tain until the end whether every­thing would work out as planned. To be on the safe side, we there­fore made an addi­tion­al trav­el can­cel­la­tion insur­ance, which would take effect in case of Coro­na-relat­ed cancellations.

On Decem­ber the 24th 2021 we went to the test cen­ter at Düs­sel­dorf air­port for the oblig­a­tory Coro­na-PCR tests before the trip. For­tu­nate­ly, these tests were neg­a­tive for all pro­tag­o­nists. On Decem­ber 25th we start­ed our malar­ia pro­phy­lax­is with one tablet each of Malarone for break­fast. After elab­o­rate report­ing of all nec­es­sary data via Inter­net to Kenya and online check-in at Lufthansa, we were able to start our jour­ney on sched­ule on Decem­ber the 26th, 2021. 

Photo Equipment

As with every pho­to safari, there was once again the ques­tion of what I should take with me from my pho­to equip­ment, which has become quite exten­sive over the years. The tele­pho­to lens­es required for a safari are large and heavy, and the hand lug­gage on the plane is lim­it­ed in size and weight.

Since these details may not inter­est every read­er, I have put my thoughts and the result­ing selec­tion into a sep­a­rate report this time ( you can find it here: Kenya 2021/22 - Pho­to Equip­ment).

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