8 Days Maasai Mara & Rwanda Gorilla Safari
Big cats in the Maasai Mara, then an hour with mountain gorillas, all in eight days
8 Days Maasai Mara & Rwanda Gorilla Safari
Eight days, two worlds. You start on the rolling grass of the Maasai Mara, flying in by light aircraft to a private conservancy where your guide can leave the track to follow a lioness, and where the vehicles at any sighting can be counted on one hand. Three nights give you dawn and dusk drives, a full day inside the reserve, a night drive for the creatures that only appear after dark, and the option of drifting over the plains in a hot-air balloon.
Then the scenery tilts. A short flight lands you in Kigali, a capital of steep hills, spotless pavements and seriously good coffee, where a morning at the Kigali Genocide Memorial gives the rest of the journey its weight. From there the road climbs to Volcanoes National Park, where dormant volcanoes rise straight out of potato fields and bamboo.
Your gorilla permit is secured in advance and included. With trackers leading the way, you climb into the forest to spend one hour with a mountain gorilla family: a silverback dozing with an arm across his face, youngsters tumbling through the vines, a mother picking burrs from her infant's fur. Golden monkeys in the bamboo and a walk through an ancient lava tube round out a short trip that feels much longer in the memory.
Ideal for: Travellers short on leave who want East Africa's two headline encounters, lions on open plains and gorillas in the mountains, with flights doing the heavy lifting.
The journey in brief
You land in Nairobi and spend a night recovering before a light aircraft carries you to the Maasai Mara for three nights of game drives, a guided walk and a night drive in a private conservancy, with an optional dawn balloon flight. On day five you fly back to Nairobi and straight on to Kigali. The next morning you visit the Kigali Genocide Memorial, explore the city's art studios and coffee roasters, then drive about two and a half hours north to Volcanoes National Park. Day seven is gorilla day, a guided trek to one habituated family, with an optional afternoon in the Musanze caves. On your final morning you track golden monkeys through the bamboo, then return to Kigali for your flight home.
Highlights
Day by day
Wheels Down in Nairobi
Your flight lands at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport, and a Geob Ventures host is waiting beyond customs with your name on a board and a cold bottle of water. The drive to your hotel in Nairobi's green southwestern suburbs takes about an hour, depending on the city's famously creative traffic. If you land before mid-afternoon, detour to the Giraffe Centre in Langata, where Rothschild's giraffes stoop over a raised platform to take pellets from your palm with long, sandpapery tongues. The evening is for recovery: a relaxed dinner, a briefing from your trip lead, and a quick repack into soft bags, because tomorrow's light aircraft allows 15 kg per person.
Light Aircraft to Lion Country
After breakfast you transfer to Wilson Airport, Nairobi's busy little airfield for bush flights. Forty-five minutes later the city has given way to a carpet of gold and green, and you bump down onto a dirt airstrip where your guide is leaning on an open-sided 4x4. Your base for three nights lies in a private conservancy on the edge of the Maasai Mara National Reserve, where the number of vehicles at a sighting is capped and guides may drive off-road to follow animals. Lunch, a siesta through the heat, then an afternoon drive as the light softens. Lion prides here often spend the late afternoon stretching, yawning and slowly deciding whether tonight is a hunting night.
Balloon at Dawn, Cats by Day
If you have opted for the balloon, a wake-up knock comes at around 4.30 am. You lift off as the sky turns pink and drift for about an hour above the plains, watching hippos plod back to the river and giraffes cast shadows longer than trees. A bush breakfast waits where the basket lands. Otherwise, set out early with your guide, who reads the plains through alarm calls and circling vultures. The day continues inside the reserve with a picnic lunch on a rise above the Mara River, where crocodiles bask on the sandbanks. After dinner, a night drive in the conservancy reveals springhares, genets and perhaps a lioness on the hunt, caught in a red-filtered spotlight.
On Foot, Then on the Trail of Cheetahs
Walking is allowed in the conservancy, so this morning you head out on foot with a ranger and a Maasai guide who reads tracks the way you read headlines. The pace is slow and the focus is small: dung beetles rolling their prizes, plants used as medicine, the scrapes where an impala ram has marked his territory. Back at camp, brunch stretches out on the deck. In the afternoon your guide goes looking for cheetahs, which favour the open short-grass plains and hunt in daylight while lions doze. Your last Mara evening ends with a sundowner on a ridge, the plains turning copper below you and the first stars coming out over the escarpment.
From the Plains to the Hills
One final early drive, then breakfast and the short hop back to Wilson Airport. A driver takes you across Nairobi to Jomo Kenyatta International for the 1 hour 15 minute flight to Kigali. Set your watch back an hour on landing, since Rwanda runs on Central Africa Time, and leave behind any plastic bags: they have been banned here since 2008. Your Rwandan guide meets you in arrivals and drives you uphill into a capital of red-roofed houses and swept pavements. On the last Saturday of every month the whole country turns out for Umuganda, a morning of community work, which explains a lot. Dinner tonight is at a rooftop restaurant downtown, with the buzz of motorbike taxis drifting up from the street.
Kigali: Memory, Canvas and Coffee
This morning begins at the Kigali Genocide Memorial in Gisozi, where more than 250,000 victims of the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi are buried. The exhibits are clear, carefully told and deeply moving; allow at least ninety minutes, and the space to be quiet afterwards. Later, the mood lifts with the city's creative side: studios where young painters work in bold colour, and a tasting room where a roaster walks you through Rwanda's bourbon coffees, from washing station to cup. After lunch, the road north climbs through terraced hills for about two and a half hours. The volcanoes appear in the early evening, blue and immense, as you reach Volcanoes National Park.
One Hour, One Gorilla Family
Breakfast is early, because the briefing at the park headquarters in Kinigi starts at 7 am. Rangers assign each group of up to eight trekkers to a habituated gorilla family, matching the walk to your fitness where they can. You drive to the trailhead, pick up a porter if you want one, and climb through potato fields to the stone wall that marks the park boundary. Beyond it, bamboo and nettles close in. Trackers radio ahead, and then there they are: a silverback stripping wild celery, a mother grooming an infant, juveniles wrestling in the vines. You stay one hour at a respectful distance. If your legs have energy left, visit the Musanze caves this afternoon.
Gold in the Bamboo, Then Home
One more morning in the forest. Golden monkeys, found only in the mountains of the Albertine Rift, live in the park's bamboo belt, and the trek to reach them is usually shorter and gentler than yesterday's. They are quick, noisy and endlessly photogenic, orange-gold backs flashing between green stems as they strip bamboo shoots. If you would rather stretch your legs further, swap the monkeys for the steep hike to Dian Fossey's grave at her old Karisoke research site, which sits in the saddle between two volcanoes. After lunch, your guide drives you back to Kigali, about two and a half hours, in good time for your evening flight home.
Your route
The parks, lakes and towns you'll travel through, in order.
What's included
Prices
Book as a group and the saving is applied to your quote.
Rates are per person per day, sharing a room, and cover everything under what's included. Your tailored quote confirms the final price for your dates. International flights are not included.
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8 Days Maasai Mara & Rwanda Gorilla Safari · 8 days
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