The Kenyan Safari

For any wildlife enthusiast, the holy grail of watching wildlife is Africa — be it the Masai Mara, the Serengeti, the Kruger, or any of the other famous reserves. Visiting one of them had long been on our bucket list.

The opportunity finally arose when my cousin (nephew), Srikanth (“Siri”), called one day to say he was signing up for a safari along with his old colleague, “Coach” Sampath. Anita and I jumped at the idea and signed up too.

The Prep

I had been to Tanzania in 2012 to climb Kilimanjaro, so I knew the drill — though I still had to brush up and update myself. We got our mandatory yellow fever vaccinations (administered at only one place in Bengaluru), sorted our travel insurance, and picked up a good pair of binoculars — we went with Nikon Monarch M5 10x42s. The Kenya visa, called an eTA, turned out to be a simple process. With all that done, we were set to fly to Nairobi via Mumbai.

Some of us already knew each other, while others didn’t, so we met up for a morning walk at Lalbagh, and a few of us also crossed paths at the vaccination centre.

Vaccination time

Day 1 — The Euphoria

We landed in Nairobi and got our first look at the vehicles that would be ours for the next few days. All of us were thrilled. We split up and packed ourselves into three vehicles — thirteen of us in all.

Then began the long drive from Nairobi to Ol Pejeta (about 200 km, roughly four hours), in Laikipia County in central Kenya. Ol Pejeta sits on the Laikipia Plateau, between the foothills of the Aberdares and Mount Kenya, straddling the equator at 1,700–2,100 m above sea level—high enough to stay pleasantly cool despite sitting right on the equator. Spread over 360 km² (about 90,000 acres), it’s the largest black rhino sanctuary in East Africa, made up of open grasslands, acacia woodland, and riverine forest along the Ewaso Ny’iro River. It’s also home to the Sweetwaters Chimpanzee Sanctuary, where rescued chimpanzees are rehabilitated.

We checked in at Maisha Sweetwaters, a lovely resort on the periphery of the Ol Pejeta Conservancy, had lunch, and headed straight out for our first-ever safari. After a quick registration formality, we were driven in.

We quickly spotted zebras and rhinos — there are two varieties, black and white. White rhinos aren’t actually white; the name comes from a mistranslation of the Dutch word wijd (wide, referring to their square lip), which became “white” in English. Black rhinos, by contrast, have a more pointed mouth.

Moving on, we sighted bustards, herds of buffalo, impala, and gazelle — but the highlight was a lioness resting in the grass, so perfectly camouflaged we could barely make her out. Later, as the sun began its descent, she stood up, yawned, stretched (in that unmistakable cat-and-dog way), and started to move.

Feeling thoroughly satisfied as dusk set in; we headed out of the conservancy. After a quick sundowner and dinner, we retired for the night.

Day 2 — A Lesson in the Law of the Jungle

We were advised to start early, so after a 6 a.m. breakfast we clambered into the vehicles like excited schoolchildren on a field trip.

We got a taste of the jungle’s ruthlessness very quickly. A hyena had attacked a buffalo calf and maimed it — a hyena’s typical hunting technique is a bone-crushing bite to the leg that incapacitates its prey, which it then devours alive. It’s every bit as ghastly as it sounds. The hyena began disembowelling the calf while it was still alive; the calf bleated in pain as its mother watched, shocked. She charged in to chase the hyena away, which retreated tactically, only to circle back to its meal. This went on for some time, the mother bellowing to call her herd mates — who had evidently been separated from her, leaving her and the calf an easy target. By the time the rest of the herd arrived, it was too late.

That was our first-hand experience of the brutal truth of predator-prey dynamics in the wild. Shaken and rather subdued, we continued our drive.

We went on to see hippos, black and white rhinos, herds of buffalo, zebra, gazelle, impala, and other herbivores, along with plenty of warthogs — part of the “Ugly Five,” the lesser-known counterpart to the “Big Five” of the African bush. We also finally sighted several giraffes, after they’d proved elusive the day before.

The high point of the day was watching three lionesses that had just brought down a zebra. Having had their fill, one got up to wander off. Our guide correctly guessed she was heading to a nearby waterhole and got us there ahead of her — rewarding us with a superb sighting as she walked right past our vehicle on her way to drink.

We returned that afternoon with mixed feelings; it took me a while to process the hyena-and-buffalo incident and simply accept it as the law of the jungle. I moved on — as, I imagine, did that mother buffalo.

Hyena and the Buffalo

Day 3 — A Lesson from Failure

We checked out of Maisha Sweetwaters and set off on the long, four-hour drive to Lake Nakuru. On the way, we crossed the equator, moving from the Southern to the Northern Hemisphere.

After lunch and a short rest at the Sarova Woodland, we headed out to see the famed flamingos at Lake Nakuru — one of the Rift Valley lakes, sitting at an elevation of 1,754 m (5,755 ft). South of Nakuru town and protected within Lake Nakuru National Park, it’s a highly alkaline “soda” lake with no outlet to any river system. That alkalinity and heat produce an abundance of algae, which in turn draws the flamingos.

We spotted plenty of water birds — pelicans, spoonbills, marabou storks (again, a part of the “Ugly five”), African fish eagles — along with baboons and the common eland (Taurotragus oryx), the largest antelope species in the world.

Later, as we drove through the forest, our guides picked up some excited chatter on the walkie-talkie and headed to a spot where a few other vehicles had already gathered. The guide told us several lions were lying in the shade of a tree barely 50 metres away. We looked, peered through our binoculars—and saw nothing. We were fairly convinced our guide was pulling our leg. He insisted we stay put, assuring us we were at a good vantage point. Sceptical but out of options, we sat there, twiddling our thumbs.

After a fair bit of boredom, a helicopter flew overhead — and, as if by magic, the entire lion pride we’d failed to spot suddenly rose up out of what had been perfect camouflage: several lionesses, their cubs, and finally the king himself. It was a genuinely hair-raising moment.

As this drama unfolded, we noticed a herd of zebra grazing in the background, maybe 500 metres away — and so did the lionesses. It was strategy time. We don’t know how they communicated, but they clearly had a plan: one moved left, one moved right, and one held position — a stalker and two flankers, ready to cut off the prey’s escape. To us, every zebra looked the same, but the lionesses clearly had a specific target in mind.

The stalker moved in with incredible stealth as we held our breath, anticipating a coordinated kill. Their patience and focus, even with an audience of tourist vehicles watching, were remarkable. After a long, tense build-up, the attack finally came — and the zebras scattered in every direction. The prey escaped; the predators came away empty-handed.

The king, like any commander surveying a failed campaign, watched his troops regroup. When the lead lioness returned, there was a brief exchange between them — a scolding, or perhaps reassurance that it’s alright to fail sometimes. We’ll never know. Life carried on as usual: the cubs went back to playing, the adults took a stroll and gave us the poses we’d been hoping for all along.

Day 4 — Nakuru to Masai Mara

A long travel day — about five hours — took us southeast of Nairobi, bordering Tanzania’s Serengeti. The drive gave us time to get to know our fellow travellers better, as long journeys tend to do.

Our camp was inside the Masai Mara reserve, overlooking the Mara River. We had lunch on a small cliff above the riverbank, with hippos for company — some basking in the sun, others submerged for long stretches, surfacing occasionally for air.

Out on our first Mara safari, we were quickly rewarded with a sighting of the reserve’s oldest cheetah. She sat atop a termite mound, waiting for the sun to dip, eyeing two herds — one at her twelve o’clock, one at three — before settling her focus on the one to her right. Realising we were blocking her line of sight, our guide quietly repositioned the vehicle closer to what looked like her intended target.

It was a masterclass in patience. For those of us used to instant gratification and constant stimulation, simply doing nothing and waiting took some getting used to — but it was a lesson worth learning. There’s a lovely Kannada saying that captures it well: ತಾಳಿದವನು ಬಾಳಿಯಾನು — roughly, “the one who has patience will flourish.”

As dusk settled, our cheetah showed no urgency at all, despite looking lean and clearly primed for a hunt. None of the herds ever came within striking range, and eventually she let the opportunity go for the day. Disappointed, we turned back toward camp — but were rewarded on the way with a spectacular Masai Mara sunset. Not everything on a safari must be about the animals; nature has plenty to offer on its own when you’re in the right frame of mind. Our resident shutterbugs got to work capturing the moment, and Day 4 ended.

Day 5 — A Lion’s Share

We started before dawn, almost like a night safari, and watched the sky break open in colour over the undulating grassland — the sun moves fast at the equator, and so does the sunset. From a distance, I caught a beautiful scene of zebras and other animals grazing against a softly lit horizon, and managed to capture it on camera.

Later that morning we tracked two pairs of lions with their respective mates, each male trying to court a lioness and start a pride of his own. The lionesses played hard to get, feigning disinterest while glancing back to check whether their suitors were still around — occasionally granting their assent, at which point mating followed. It was an interesting study in patience and persistence on the males’ part, matched by an equally deliberate game on the females.

We had a bush breakfast by the river later that day, hippos once again keeping us company. In the evening we found two brother lions living up to the old cliché of being “as lazy as lions,” and, having lost interest in them, turned our attention to birds instead — vultures nesting, a hammerkop, spoonbills, African fish eagles, and more, all expertly pointed out by our guide. The day ended without any dramatic sightings, but it was a good one all the same.

Day 6 — Scaling Small Heights

A few of us signed up for a hot-air balloon flight — one of the must-dos on any African safari. We left camp at 5 a.m., and a forty-minute drive brought us to an open grassy plain, already alive with activity in the near-dark. After signing indemnity forms and getting briefed on how to brace inside the sixteen-seater basket — we were warned the takeoff would be bumpy — we climbed in. To our relief, it was far gentler than advertised, and we were soon airborne.

What had been billed as a “silent flight” turned out to be silence punctuated by the loud roar of the gas burner — loud enough that my Apple Watch flagged a noise warning, something that has never happened even on the factory floor. The flight itself was uneventful in terms of wildlife, but the real highlight was the sunrise and what came after landing: a bush breakfast spread, complete with champagne.

After the quiet thrill of the balloon ride, we rejoined the rest of the group, who’d been out on the ground safari.

The Leopard Queen

We spent some time driving around trying to spot a big cat. The leopard, along with the black rhino, is said to be the most elusive of Africa’s iconic animals. Our guides scanned the bushes near a stream for a while, and we’d more or less given up hope of a sighting.

Then they noticed a group of giraffes suddenly freeze — clearly reacting to something we couldn’t see. We searched through our binoculars and found nothing. As we began to pull away, I caught a flicker of movement in the bush — something that looked like a big cat — and mentioned it to our driver-guide. He backed up and scanned the area with practised eyes but still saw nothing.

We were ready to call it a day when our travel companion Sampath spotted a leopard stepping out into the open. We all stood up to watch. She was intently focused on a lone wildebeest in the grassland and moved past our vehicle and across the road with complete concentration, tracking her prey. After one careful look, though, she decided the wildebeest was too large to take on and abandoned the hunt — instead letting out a series of short calls that our guide identified as her summoning her cubs. After a patient wait, we were rewarded with a cub emerging from hiding to join its mother.

We ended the day thoroughly satisfied.

Day 7 — Leopard, Again

We were out early again, and the morning was fairly quiet — the usual giraffes, zebras, elands, topis, gazelle, hippos, warthogs, hyenas, and a few lions. After a bush breakfast, we resumed the search.

A crackle over the radio set our guides into motion, and they drove off without explanation. When we arrived, we were shown a tree where a leopard had stashed its kill — a warthog — safely up among the branches. The leopard itself had to be close by, and after a short wait, it emerged from the surrounding grass. It climbed the tree with effortless confidence, settled beside its kill, and began to feed — pausing now and then to glance around and offer a few perfect poses for the cameras.

Days 8 & 9

These were relatively quiet days, apart from a memorable moment when we passed a herd of elephants and spotted a lioness stalking a baby elephant. She abandoned the attempt fairly quickly and returned to her pride.

We also spotted three lions feasting on their kill - a buffalo

By this point, we’d sighted the full Big Five — lion, buffalo, rhino, elephant, and leopard. What more could we ask for?

The Migration

The single biggest draw of a Masai Mara or Serengeti safari is “the Migration” — the mass movement of wildebeest, often called the weathermen of the bush for their uncanny ability to sense rain and head toward areas where fresh grass will follow. They travel alongside zebras, prized for their memory and knowledge of the terrain — a kind of built-in GPS for the herd.

Unfortunately, the rains had failed in the Mara that season, leaving the grass dry. The grazing herds had reached the Mara River but turned back rather than cross it. Without that crossing, the crocodiles that lie in wait miss their feast, and so do the predators that follow the herds — and we missed out on that entire drama of life and death. It was a genuine disappointment, and we’ve promised ourselves we’ll return one day to witness the Great Migration in full swing.

It was soon time to say goodbye to the wonderful team at Malaika Camp, who had looked after us so well throughout. Our driver-guides dropped us back in Nairobi — not without a final bit of drama courtesy of our travel agent in Kenya, the one real blemish on an otherwise wonderful trip. Even so, we thoroughly enjoyed the journey, the company of our fellow travellers, and the incredible sightings along the way.

 

A final word of advice: Start early daily (5.30 AM) and you get to see lovely sunrise and many wildlife). Choose your travel agent carefully. Check with the local Indian community and choose wisely — it’ll spare you a lot of unnecessary stress. Kenya is a beautiful country, and Nairobi’s climate is superb. If you haven’t been on a safari in Kenya or Tanzania yet, I’d strongly recommend putting it at the top of your list.

Picture Credits: Krishna, Sathya, "Coach" Sampath, Suresh, Srikanth, and Ravi.