Top 15 Inspiring Kenya Destinations

Kenya is easily one of Africa’s greatest wildlife watching destinations, home as it is to the Big Five (African Lion, African Elephant, Cape Buffalo, African Leopard, and White/Black rhinos). You will also be on a responsible safari where the host communities benefit both directly and indirectly from our sustainable tourism programs.

From mid-July to October, more than a million wildebeest migrate from the plains of Serengeti National Park in the neighboring Tanzania to Kenya’s compact Masai Mara. On the migration trail, hundreds of thousands of Thompson’s Gazelle, Burchell’s Zebra and Eland accompany the Wildebeest.

When the timing is perfect, nothing comes close to comparison from witnessing the happening in person the mass movement of animals, lumbering, strutting and swaying in one of the great wonders of the natural world. The wildebeest migration is one of the world’s greatest natural spectacles 

Coming to Africa for the first time? Kenya is one of the best countries in Africa for those on their first wildlife-watching holiday. With endless safari possibilities that allow you spend a minimum of 4 days to a maximum of over one month on safari.

Kenya’s safari industry is backed up by an efficient tourist infrastructure with dazzling choices of luxurious camps, hotels and lodges to suit all taste and budget. After all, Kenya is the origin of safaris. The trending modern safaris were invented back in the Twenties and to date Oluokos Signature still takes you down the memory lane in the most ethical manner.

The Masai Mara remains to be one of the best places in Africa to encounter big cats. Quietly, Cheetahs and Lions roam the plains, waiting for the wandering game while on the other hand, the leopard has mastered its posing skills in the riverside fig trees waiting to pounce with accuracy to the unnoticing prey under the tree.

The Masai Mara cats and other wildlife are so associated with the the BBC’s, Big Cat Diary TV series and this has helped in positioning Kenya in the nature-based tourism.  

Thanks to Kenya’s geography that offers the ultimate combination of both fauna-and-flora spotting odyssey in its dozens spectacular national parks, game reserves and conservancies. It’s very much in style to flop on white sand Indian Ocean beaches. 

Oluokos Signature recommends a 10-day safari-and-beach itinerary, with the first stop being in the Masai Mara, home to the black rhino, as well as elephant, cheetah, lion, and leopard. We combine this with Amboseli National Park before flying to the beach hotel for a couple of days of relaxation.

With over 1,050 recorded bird species, Kenya is a birders’ magnet. Right from the capital city of Nairobi, you can watch over 100 bird sepecies within a day. From the flamboyant conglomeration of pink flamingos whose massing makes for surreal photographs. They have been driven from Lake Nakuru in the past half-decade because of industrialization and rising water levels, and many have moved to Lake Bogoria, Lake Magadi and other alkaline lakes within the region.

Apart from matchstick-legged birds that can be seen feeding on the algae that gives them their candy floss hue, Kenya birds range from the small but unmissable finches to the bulk Turaco song master of the tree tops, the elegant Secretary bird that catwalks the plains and the bold Ostrich that poses with ease for photography. Also visit Lake Naivasha, home to Golden-winged Sunbirds, and Superb Starlings.

Further to Lake Victoria home to African Fish Eagles and numerous specialties in the swamps, you can stretch it further to the new birding frontiers of the Aderema and Katotoi Hills where some of the most sought-after birds can be found. From here find your way back through Kenya’s only rainforest, Kakamega where birding is your ordinary cup of tea – Oluokos Signature runs small group bird watching tours.

Set in a 61,000-acre conservancy, and guests can experience the wilderness by night in private huts open to the skies a 20-minute drive from the main building at the Loisaba Lodge.

Beds, which can be wheeled out into the open or taken inside if the weather turns, overlook either a watering hole or a river where there is every chance of catching sight or sound of inquisitive game. 

Less well-understood than its Tanzanian twin-sister, Mount Kilimanjaro, and considered a more challenging climb among mountaineers, Mount Kenya sits in its own national park, amid endemic fauna and flora.

The highest of three peaks rises to 5,199m, although this requires a technical climb. Even the lowest of its three summits, though, offers astounding panoramas over the plains and savannah below, and as you ascend through the foothills you may spot elephant, black Rhino, Cape Buffalo, Colobus monkey, antelopes and the Giant Forest Hog.

Founded in 1932, Treetops is Kenya’s oldest safari lodge, and the historical part of this is that Princess Elizabeth was in residence here when she was told of the death of her father, King George VI, prompting her ascendency to the throne. “For the first time in the history of the world,” wrote big-game hunter Jim Corbett in the Treetops logbook, “a young girl climbed into the tree as a princess and climbed down as a queen.” Let this history not to pass you.

Kenyan artists are talented and they make covetable art pieces. Organize for a visit to the Kitengela glass, which is made in the middle of the bush, and products from Ocean Sole, which pays local people to pick up old shoes washed up on the beach and turn them into toys. Also look out for beaded belts and shoes, which are sold across the country. 

The famous Giraffe Manor is set in 12 acres of private land in a Nairobi suburb and allows guests to participate in sunset feeding sessions. Expect other impromptu feeding sessions: the herd of Rothschild Giraffes will often poke their heads through the windows of the manor house for extra treats. Get ready, this is Kenya!

Whirlwinds, dust plains, Masai herders, herds of elephant, wide plains and dramatic escarpments all define the Great Rift Valley, which reaches through Kenya as part of a 6,000-km long scar that stretches from Jordan in the Middle East across Africa to Mozambique. All safari operators in Kenya offer a stop-over at the many points of interest on the escarpment.

The least-visited Western Kenya is home to rolling tea plantations, lush swamps, and equatorial forests, along with Kenya’s second-highest mountain and the largest lake in Africa.

However, the ultimate highlight is the Masai Mara a natural continuation of the famous Serengeti Plains undulating grassland, dramatic escarpments, beautiful acacia forests – and the greatest wildlife show on earth.

Scaling up the heights of Mount Elgon sampling Nile Perch big fishing opportunities, birding the remote islands, or just basking lazily on the mainland beaches of Lake Victoria are among the so many leisure activities to undertake while in Western Kenya.

With some of the most breath-taking sunrises and sunsets, Western Kenya remains to be one of the best locations in Kenya to see some of Kenya’s most sought-after bird species in its forests, swamps, lakes, and rivers, and even in the scattered hills with its neighboring countries. Beyond flora and fauna, it’s in Western Kenya where the 44^th former US president, Barack Obama has his roots in the village of Alego, Kogelo. Well known to be among the most welcoming communities, the culture here isn’t something to be missed. Welcome to Western Kenya!

Not often visited, Kenya’s Northern Frontier is home to the world’s largest desert lake – the 7 million-hectare Lake Turkana. The lake is more than 290 kilometers long, 30 meters deep and 32 kilometers at its wide. Shared with Ethiopia, most of the lake falls within the borders of Kenya with only a small section of the northern tip extending into Ethiopia.

Lake Turkana is notable for its incredible size; the greenish-blue color (jade) of the water that is created by the presence of algae is another natural curiosity that holds the imaginations of many guests. The Jade Sea waters is home to more than 40 species of fish, over 200 bird species, and  the Nile crocodiles that bask in the sunlight along the shores. An expedition to Lake Turkana isn’t for the faint-hearted as the high temperatures in the remote desert always reward our guests every night with alluring African sky.

Northwest of Kitale, Mount Elgondominates the horizon, at least on the rare occasions when it is not shrouded in clouds. Elgon is around 880 meters short of Mount Kenya in terms of altitude, but the circumference of its base makes it a bigger massif. The upper slopes of this extinct volcano support a cover of lush montane forest giving way to moorland at higher altitudes, and are protected withinMount Elgon National Park, one of the country’s least visited sanctuaries. The dense tall forest and a lack of roads inhibit game viewing on the mountain, but it is possible to hike up to the summit, across moorlands of giant heather.