"A Brief Stop to Visit the Animals " a Masai Mara Game Reserve Travel Page by glabah

Masai Mara is a dry and vast part of Africa. Certainly, there are animals that feed on the dry grasslands, and yet other animals (most notably lion) that feed on those herbivores. However, this is not a forested part of Africa. There are occasional trees, which are more dense around rivers and other water, but for the most part, you can see as far as the curves of the land allows - which in some cases is fairly far.

I was only here for about a day and a half. Even so, it was enough to see quite an extensive number of animals, and get some impression of the huge wildebeest migration - though our group did not see them crossing the river. There had been enough rain for adequate grazing, so they were not migrating very far during our visit.

I definitely suggest staying right in the game park itself - considering how far it is to any nearby cities with any accomodation.

Our group stayed at the Masai Mara Sopa Lodge. This is a great place to stay, and has a large number of tourists staying at it from all over the world.

However, you came to (or are thinking of visiting, or are planning to go to?) Africa in order to see wildlife. So, it seems to me that most people would be better off staying at the Keekorok lodge (we didn't stay at Keekorok but we stopped by for a visit to their gift shop and the water hole). This lodge has a really nice water hole nearby, and an elaborate viewing platform and elevated walkway system for seeing the wildlife that visits the waterhole. The Sopa Lodge doesn't have this type of facility. However, the view from the Sopa Lodge dining room and swimming pool is pretty impressive because the lodge sits on the side of a hill.

Sopa lodge is also closer to one of the Masai communities, and therefore if you are interested in seeing some of that culture you may prefer the lodge for that reason. The Sopa lodge is also very African in its appearance.

Both are quite good places, so carefully consider what you are interested in seeing. Maybe a few nights in both if your budget isn't limited?

Game Drives are the primary reason to come to the Masai Mara. The Wildebeest Migration is quite famous because of the sheer number of animals involved, and the hippo pools are one way of picking up another country, because you cross a small marker on the border between Tanzania and Kenya going there. This small corner of Tanzania can only be accessed through Kenya.

If you can, try to stay reasonably late in the park, and get an early start in the morning. The wildlife is more active then. It is a lot easier to do this if you are at one of the lodges inside the park as well.

Telephoto equipment is definitely something that is very useful here.

If you stay at Keekorok or Masai Mara Sopa lodge and go on a game drive out of either of those lodges, chances are that you will also be able to visit one small corner of Tanzania as the border crosses a loop in the river that makes a small part of Tanzania impossible to access except from Kenya. There is a concrete marker to show where this small corner of Tanzania starts.