Kenya's outstanding wildlife and scenery are among its major draws for visitors
As the east African country celebrates Independence Day, we show you Kenya's appeal - including the Big Five, chasm-like valleys and Indian Ocean beaches
December 12 marks Jamhuri Day in Kenya, the day the nation gained independence in 1963 and became a republic the year after (“Jamhuri” is republic in Swahili). The national holiday sees parades, political speeches, dancing and feasts of roasted meat and beer. The day also marks the start of the Christmas festivities in this predominantly Christian country.
Jamhuri Day is not the only attraction Kenya has going for it. Here are 23 other reasons to visit.
1. It’s the best value it’s been for two years
In mid-2013, £1 bought you 125 Kenyan shillings; today, you’ll get 152. That means, budgeting on 10,000 Kenyan shillings a day, which will allow you to travel fairly luxuriously, you're looking at £66 a day, rather than a £77 a day as it would have been two years ago. Over the course of a 10-day holiday, it equates to a saving of £100 per person.
2. Entry is simpler than ever
Kenyan authorities introduced an e-visa system in September, meaning that British travellers no longer need apply for entry documents before travelling, or queue at the airport for all the right stamps. A single entry visa costs $51 per person (£34) and the e-visa site is linked from the British Foreign Office’s Kenya travel advice page. Ensure that you use the official e-visa website to avoid being scammed by fake providers.
3. You might spot the Big Five
Kenya is easily one of Africa’s – and the world’s – greatest wildlife watching destinations. The African lion, African elephant, Cape buffalo, African leopard, and white/black rhinos can all be spotted in its reserves, and although the term “Big Five” was originally coined by big game hunters, today the focus has shifted to conserving the species. Responsible safari operators include Sarara Campand Kampi Ya Kanzi - Lisa Grainger, a writer for Telegraph Travel who visits Africa frequently, writes: “The local people own the camps and all benefit goes back into their own communities, rather than a rich operator's pocket.”
• Why you should travel to Kenya now
4. And have the chance to watch the greatest migration on Earth
From mid-August to October, more than a million of wildebeest migrate from the Serengeti in neighbouring Tanzania to Kenya’s Maasai Mara park, accompanied by hundreds of thousands of Thomson’s gazelle, zebra and eland. Despite the plethora of videos and photography of the migration available online, nothing comes close to seeing in person the mass movement of animals, lumbering, strutting and swaying in one of the great wonders of the natural world.
5. It's ideal for safari first-timers
Brian Jackman, Telegraph Travel's safari expert, recommends Kenya as one of the best countries in Africa for those on their first wildlife watching expedition: "If you catch an overnight flight from Heathrow you can transfer to a light aircraft next morning and be in the bush in time for brunch. Such things are possible in Nairobi because Kenya’s safari industry is backed up by an efficient tourist infrastructure with a dazzling choice of camps and lodges to suit all budgets. This is, after all, where modern safaris were invented back in the Twenties."
6. Its majestic big cats
Our safari expert, Brian Jackman, recommends the Masai Mara as one of the best places in Africa to encounter big cats. “Cheetahs and lions roam the plains, waiting for the migrating wildebeest, and leopards pose in its riverside fig trees. In fact, the animals are so associated with this region that the BBC chose the Mara for their Big Cat Diary TV series”, he writes, in his guide to the 10 best luxury safaris in Africa.
7. After a safari, flop on the beach
Kenya’s geography means that it offers the perfect combination of fauna-and-flora spotting adventures in its dozens of mighty national parks, and opportunities for lying prostrate on white sand Indian Ocean beaches. Africa Travel (africatravel.com) recommends an 11-day safari-and-beach itinerary, with the first stop at Ol Pejeta Conservancy reserve, home to the country’s highest population of black rhino, as well as elephant, cheetah, lion, and leopard. Guests then move onto a beach hotel for a couple of days of watersports and relaxation.
8. The bird life will have you all a flutter
Kenya has more than 1,000 recorded bird species, including flamboyant crowds of pink flamingos whose massing makes for surreal photographs. They have been driven from Lake Nakuru in the past half decade because of industrialisation and rising water levels, and many have moved to Lake Bogoria, which covers 32 square kilometres (12 sq miles). The matchstick-legged birds can be seen feeding on the algae that gives them their candyfloss hue amid geysers that result from the lake’s geothermal activity. Also visit Lake Naivasha, home to Golden-winged Sunbirds, Superb Starlings and African Fish Eagles – Naturetrek (naturetrek.co.uk) runs small group wildlife-watching tours.
9. You can sleep under the stars
Losaiba Lodge is set in a 61,000 acre reserve, and guests can experience the wilderness by night in private huts open to the skies a 20-minute drive from the main building. 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 passing game.
• Five of the best African safari camps under the stars
10. Mount Kenya rivals Mount Kilimanjaro
Less well-known than Tanzanian 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 ehino, Cape buffalo, Colobus monkey, antelope and Giant Forest hog.
11. It has ancient sites that will interest everyone
Even for those who sigh at the prospect of poking around old ruins, the former town of Gedi near Kenya’s coast will not fail to captivate. With origins in the 12th century, this Swahili town reached its zenith in the 15th century, and its wealth is indicated by the clusters of mosques, a magnificent palace and houses, all in 45 acres of primeval forest. It was first visited as an archaeological site by Sir John Kirk, a British resident of Zanzibar in 1884, and is today maintained by the National Museums of Kenya.
12. It’s home to one of the Queen’s favourite hotels
Founded in 1932, Treetops is Kenya’s oldest safari lodge, and 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.’”
13. Wills proposed to Kate in Kenya
Kate Middleton and Prince William stayed at Lewa Wildlife Conservancy in the foothills of Mount Kenya in October 2010, and came home as fiancé and fiancée, after the heir to the throne proposed to his then-girlfriend at the luxury lodges. Lewa, which has 55,000 acres of savannah and has been a Unesco World Heritage Site since 2013, is home to the Grevy’s zebra, and more than 70 black rhinos, as well as elephants, lions and cheetah. Unfortunately, a rhino was poached from Lewa in 2012, a reminder of the need to protect Kenya’s wildlife and find alternative forms of income for locals – rising demand for rhino horn from east Asia has led to hunting oiubreaks that the Kenya Wildlife Service has struggled to contain.
14. Tourism protects Kenya’s people and wildlife:
Indeed, sensible tourism can be an alternative to poaching and discourage people from engaging in it. Telegraph Travel’s Lisa Grainger writes: “If tourism dies in Kenya, then there is no one to support the people who make their living from it, and the rangers who protect the wildlife. So communities have to turn to wildlife for food – and are forced to go into the cities to look for work. Tourism here really does protect traditional ways of life, and cultures, and wilderness.”
15. The Foreign Office relaxed its Kenya travel advice
Although the Foreign Office still advises against all but essential travel to the north half of Kenya's coastline, all the way along the Somali border, and Lamu island, citing threats from extremists linked to Al Shabaab, the Somali militant group, it removed warnings against visiting the southern half of the coastline this June. This means Kenya's white sand beaches are open to tourists again, at least partially. Gill Charlton, visiting for Telegraph Travel this year, found that, "in coastal communities where the travel ban has been lifted, there is a renewed vigilance and a determination to preserve the open-minded tolerance for which the Swahili culture has long been known." You should still check the Foreign Office's latest advice before booking a trip: gov.uk/foreign-travel-advice/kenya
16. You’ll come home with real mementoes, not tourist tat
Kenya is home to craftspeople that make covetable objects. Lisa Grainger suggests: “Kitengela glass (made in a glassworks in the middle of the bush), Ocean Sole (which pays local people to pick up old shoes washed up on the beach and turn them into toys), and Linda Camm (who has trained local women to make gorgeous beaded belts and shoes).
17. You can eat breakfast accompanied by giraffes
The famous Giraffe Manor in 12 acres of private land in a Nairobi suburb allows guests to participate in sunset feeding sessions, and the herd of Rothschild giraffes that live here will often poke their heads through the manor house windows for extra treats.
18. There are landscapes like this
Maasai 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.
19. A national park called Hell’s Gate
Named after a narrow crack in the cliffs, once a tributary of a prehistoric lake, this national park north-west of Nairobi is home to Fischer's Tower and Central Tower columns. Visitors can walk among buffalo, zebra, eland and Thomson’s gazelle and see baboons scratching each other – and stop to be rendered silent by the beauty of the Njorowa gorge’s red sandstone walls.
20. To relive Out of Africa fantasies
It’s 30 years this December since the release of the film Out of Africa, an adaptation of Karen Blixen's 1937 memoir of the same name. The opening line, “I had a farm in Africa at the foot of the Ngong Hills”, can be relived at Angama Mara, a new lodge whose South Camp will have the film poster’s kopje at the foot of their bed.
21. And to visit Karen Blixen’s home
The author’s former home in Nairobi is now a museum – the farmhouse contains rooms decorated with props from the 1985 film. The grounds have original equipment from the coffee farm, as well as peaceful gardens and lush forest, with views to Karen’s Ngong Hills.
22. To visit Denys Finch Hatton’s grave
The aristocrat, big game hunter and lover of Karen Blixen is buried 13 miles from her home in a space cared for by a local family. It is available to view by appointment only. On the grave is written: “He prayeth well, who loveth well – both man and bird and beast” - lines from Coleridge’s The Rime of the Ancient Marnier, recited by Robert Redford in the famous hair-washing scene in Out of Africa.
23. Nairobi has a thriving creative arts scene
More adventurous travellers will look to the capital, which has a reputation for high crime levels and few reasons to stick around. However, centres such as GoDown Arts Centre, Shifteye Gallery, and The Kuono Trust offer visitors and locals the chance to see Kenyan creative at work, showing another side to Nairobi. Live music fans should check out jazz, hip hop and dub performances too.
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