Angama Safari Camp

Angama Safari Camp takes one party at a time, and that party is you. It is a standing camp inside the Maasai Mara National Reserve, set among the herds rather than above them, and nobody else is staying.

The difference from the escarpment is time. Because you sleep in the reserve, you are with the animals at first light and can stay out until the last, which gives you roughly two hours more on the plains each day. The afternoon drive starts from your tent.

That matters most at the river. On both our journeys that use the camp, your guide watches the herds along the Mara River from before dawn and positions your vehicle at the crossing point with no other vehicles in sight. You wait, sometimes for hours, while the wildebeest gather on the bank. When the first one goes, the river fills with animals, and you stay as long as it lasts. On East Africa by Air you also go up in a hot-air balloon at dawn and come down to a champagne breakfast in the grass.

It suits people who have done a lodge safari before and want the Mara at its rawest, and small parties who value having a guide and a camp to themselves.

On East Africa by Air you drive down off the escarpment from Angama Mara. On Gorillas, Migration & Golf a Cessna Caravan flies you straight in from Wilson Airport, Nairobi. You leave by Caravan for the Grumeti in Tanzania, or by Pilatus PC-12 for Kigali.

Good to know

• Crossings depend on the herds. We plan four nights so you have the best chance of one.
• The Mara is a malaria area; take advice on prophylaxis.
• The Migration is usually in the Mara from July to October.

Country: Kenya