African Safaris

Since our first trip to Africa in 2013, we have been infect­ed by the Africa virus. A safari is a com­plete­ly dif­fer­ent way to trav­el. The expe­ri­ence of see­ing untouched nature and the big wild ani­mals in free­dom is incred­i­ble. When else, on vaca­tion, do you vol­un­tar­i­ly get up every morn­ing at 5:30am before sun­rise, just to be able to expe­ri­ence this out in the wild. The vast­ness and the light in the African steppe touch the mind immense­ly. When you observe the large herds of ani­mals, you feel very small, lit­er­al­ly like being in anoth­er world. For the wildlife pho­tog­ra­ph­er, Africa is the absolute place of desire.

After 6 trips to Africa up to now, I have already gained some exper­tise that I would like to share here. At first I have arranged some gen­er­al safari tips, fol­lowed by links to the reports about our last trips.

We have been on safari in Africa sev­er­al times since 2013. On these trips we trav­elled with a pri­vate jeep and our own guide/driver in Kenya and Tan­za­nia and vis­it­ed sev­er­al nation­al parks and reserves.

Such a safari is quite unfa­mil­iar at the begin­ning and com­plete­ly dif­fer­ent from oth­er hol­i­day trips.

In this short arti­cle, I have col­lect­ed some of my expe­ri­ences and tips that might be help­ful for any­one plan­ning an own trip.

December 26th 2021 to January 7th 2022

Our last Africa safari was almost 3 years ago and the Africa virus in us gave no rest. In the mean­time, a lot had hap­pened. The world was almost at a stand­still because of the Covid 19 pandemic.

In 2021, long-dis­tance trav­el would final­ly be a pos­si­bil­i­ty again, so we start­ed plan­ning a new trip.

This time we first went to the Masai Mara again for 5 nights. Then we flew with Mom­basa Air for 2 days to Amboseli Nation­al Park and final­ly end­ed the trip with a 3-day stay in Lumo Con­ver­san­cy, in the fan­tas­tic Lions Bluff Lodge.

 

December 27th 2018 to January 6th 2019

As I changed my job on July 2018, my sum­mer hol­i­day was post­poned in 2018. Instead, we planned a 10-day vaca­tion over the turn of the year 2018 to 2019. This time, the three of us, my wife Simone, my daugh­ter Luise and I, went to the Masai Mara for 9 nights. We were very curi­ous how it would be there  at this time of year - short­ly after the small rainy sea­son and with­out the big wilde­beest herds, which at this time of the year are back in the Serengeti.

 

August 8th to 22th 2017

Hard­ly back from Tan­za­nia last year, we imme­di­ate­ly start­ed plan­ning the next Africa trip. This time we were again 6 per­sons, like on our first Africa trip in 2013. From the expe­ri­ence of our last trip we want­ed to min­i­mize the stress­ful dri­ves as much as pos­si­ble and there­fore lim­it­ed our­selves to only three parks with at least 3 days stay in each.

 

August 8th to 19th 2016

In 2016 we decid­ed to vis­it the rel­a­tive­ly less known so-called “South­ern Cir­cuit” in south­ern Tan­za­nia. Unfor­tu­nate­ly we only had 2 weeks vaca­tion this time, so we booked an 11-day safari. Once again we planned a trip in our own jeep with our own guide, this time through the 3 South­ern Nation­al Parks: Miku­mi, Rua­ha and Selous.

Juli 19th to August 4th 2015

This time the 16-day trip led us through south­ern Kenya and north­ern Tan­za­nia. We vis­it­ed Amboseli Nation­al Park in Kenya, then in Tan­za­nia the Tarangire Nation­al Park, Arusha, the Ngoron­goro Crater and the Serengeti. After­wards we made a short stop at Lake Vic­to­ria in Speke Bay and returned to Kenya for a few days in the Masai Mara.

August 10th to 26th 2013

In August 2013 our dream came true. Togeth­er with good friends we went on our first safari through Kenya. For me it was even the first time that I left the Euro­pean con­ti­nent. We toured through Kenya on an indi­vid­ual safari in our own four-wheel dri­ve vehi­cle (Toy­ota Land­Cruis­er) with an excel­lent guide who accom­pa­nied us the whole time (thank you very much, Eric!). We vis­it­ed Sam­bu­ru, the Ol Peje­ta Con­ser­van­cy, Lake Naku­ru and Lake Naivasha and at last we spent some days in the Masai Mara. This great trip acti­vat­ed the African virus in us!