Masaai Mara

When one speaks of Kenya, the area known as the Maasai Mara is always at the forefront of any discussion. This is the top safari destination in the world as far as volume of travelers are concerned. This area is where the Great Migration peaks as herds upon herds of animals travel year round from the southern Serengeti of Tanzania to reach the beautiful and nutritious grasslands of the Masaai Mara. It’s a region where traditionally dressed Maasai still herd their cattle and goats in a lifestyle that hasn’t changed much since they first arrived here 300+ years ago.

The Maasai Mara gets too crowded during the peak Migration periods from June to October as “day drive minibuses” jostle for positions along the Mara River to get the best photo opportunity for their clients. This frenzy naturally disturbs the wildlife. Happily, there are strategies for avoiding the crowds and stay at more quiet reserves and conservancies.

Nowhere in Kenya has captured the world’s imagination quite like the Maasai Mara. On the short-grass savannahs of the Mara River basin, between the Loita Hills in the east and the Oloololo Escarpment in the west, hundreds of big-maned lions, large numbers of cheetah and leopards, spotted hyenas and jackals, large herds of elephants, thousands of antelope of more than a dozen species from the tiny dik-dik to the huge eland, Thomson’s and Grant’s gazelles, herds of cape buffalo, giraffe, and migratory zebras and wildebeest in their hundreds of thousands make the region a magnet for safaris of every stripe.