Today is departure day, and you fly to Kenya with stopovers on the way.

You will be met at the airport by our local guide, who will drive you to your hotel. After a short break, when you can freshen up, your first encounter with some of Africa’s wild animals awaits you! You’ll be visiting “The Giraffe Centre”, where you get right up close to the giraffes.

Lunch is enjoyed at Karen Blixen Coffee Garden – the old administration building at the writer’s coffee plantation.

If time permits, there will be a chance to visit the nearby Kazuri ceramics workshop and jewellery factory, where single mothers make clay beads – a quite remarkable employment project.

There will also be time to relax a little today before the adventure really starts tomorrow!

After breakfast, you drive north, crossing the equator near Mount Kenya. You will be given a demonstration of the Coriolis effect, i.e. why the winds are deflected to the right in the northern hemisphere and to the left in the southern hemisphere.

After standing with a leg in the northern hemisphere and one in the southern hemisphere, you drive to Samburu, and along the way, you will experience several climate and vegetation zones: plateaux, mountain areas and more dry areas. After lunch, you will go on your first proper game drive. Samburu is characterised by a number of animals which are only found here: Grevy’s zebra, the Gerenuk antelope, the enormous oryx, the Somali ostrich and the reticulated giraffe. In fact, on this safari, you may get to see three different giraffes: reticulated giraffes in Samburu, Rothschild giraffes at Lake Naivasha and Masai giraffes in Masai Mara.

Full-day game drive where you bring a picnic lunch – and perhaps even breakfast – so there’s more time for the safari itself.

In addition to the “special five”, you may also see elephants, leopards, lions, cheetahs, impalas, and lots of birds here in Samburu. The locals believe that Samburu has a bird sound all of its own. The landscapes are varied and incredibly scenic, and you may be lucky enough to see the Masais’ relatives, the Samburuans, and one of their camel caravans.

Please note that the itinerary is subject to change.

After breakfast, you’ll drive down into the Great Rift Valley, a 5,000-km-long gorge extending through the whole of East Africa. The Rift Valley is brimming with volcanic craters. It’s a stark contrast to the dry Samburu.

A couple of stops are made along the way, and at Thompson Falls, it’s time for a lunch break, when you can stretch your legs and buy lunch in the cosy café.

The final stop of the day is at the wonderful Lake Nakuru National Park. Once at the lodge, you can enjoy the beautiful view and maybe have a dip in the pool before dinner.

Early in the morning, you’ll head to the fantastic Masai Mara game reserve, the Kenyan part of the vast Serengeti ecosystem and, in the rainy season, home to probably the world’s largest concentration of wildlife. You should be prepared for the fact that the drive takes a good part of the day. However, there is Wi-Fi and power in the car, making it an ideal opportunity to upload holiday photos, take a nap or just enjoy the sight of Kenya zipping past. You drive through a number of small villages which are almost always abuzz with street markets, and a couple of stops are made along the way.

From July to October, you can experience the 1,200 km long migration for water and fresh grass of more than one million wildebeest along with a couple of hundred thousand zebras plus countless Thompson gazelles. It is during this migration that many gazelles fall victim to the huge Nile crocodiles when crossing the Mara River.

Many people believe it is best to visit Masai Mara during the great migration, but there are animals on the grasslands all year round.

Over the next couple of days, you will be going on a game drive morning and afternoon. On some days, you will bring both breakfast and a picnic lunch with you, which you can enjoy along with amazing views, but this is all agreed with the guide, who knows everything about the animals and weather conditions.

You can never have too much Masai Mara as the savannah is so changeable – the light, the colours, the smells, the mix of animals – everything changes all the time.

If you would like to visit a Masai village, you should arrange this with the guide on the safari. It costs 25 USD per person (not included in the price of the holiday) and this is paid directly to the Masai people. The Masai are a proud people who live just as their ancestors have done for 400 years. The Masai measure their wealth by the number of cows and wives they have. The more they have, the richer they are. The wives are each installed their own hut, and they do the domestic work, such as building huts and fetching firewood. Their daily diet is milk mixed with cattle blood and perhaps a little corn porridge. For celebrations, the meat of their own animals is served.

Sadly, today, it’s time to leave the savannah.

You’ll head back to Nairobi and travel on by train to new adventures in Mombasa with white sandy beaches, green palm trees, azure waters, coral reefs, fascinating history and a lively seaport.

The train journey is an amazing experience in itself. The train is comfortable, and from the windows – when driving through Tsavo, Kenya’s largest national park – you may be lucky enough to see elephants and giraffes.

On your arrival in Mombasa, you’ll be picked up from the station and driven the last stretch of the way to your beach holiday in Diani Beach, south of Mombasa.

The days are spent at your leisure.

You are picked up at the hotel and driven to the airport, where your journey home starts.

You arrive in the UK after a lovely holiday.