Kenya Holiday During Elections
I was staying down in Kinondo Retreaton the south coast of Mombasa as the recent elections and results were being announced.
I had hired my own car as am very familiar with Kenya but I arranged for a driver to take myself and my friend down to Kinondo, where we spent 6 blissful days relaxing in the sunshine.
We had a super holiday and at no time were affected by the post election troubles. Friends in the UK were texting and calling saying that they had seen all of the terrible things going on in Kenya on the television & newspapers and that we should look at coming back home.
We had no such experience at all, and only on one day did we not venture out of the resort.
On our drive back to Mombasa, we gave ourselves extra time as we were prepared for troubles on the road. We got to the airport in record time, with absolutely no problem.
The troubles are very localised and in areas that tourists would not venture. The issues are tribal, and Kenyan people are not interested in causing conflict with tourists. Tourism is one of Kenya’s biggest industries and it is such a shame that following all the media & press publicity over here as well as the travel advisory, local Kenyans are now losing their jobs as tourists have been forced to cancel.
I’m pleased to see that the government have now lifted the ‘non essential’ travel advisory and hopefully people will start to travel again. Kenya has so much to offer, wonderful safari holidays, super beaches and friendly people.
This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 22nd, 2008 at 6:20 pm and is filed under Kenya. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
Jan 23rd 2008 – I have just returned from two weeks in Kenya, I arrived the day after the elections so I was there when the results were announced. I spent my holiday on the south coast, Nairobi, Amboseli and the Maasi Mara. All of which were amazing.
At no time did I feel threaten by any unrest that was going on in very localised areas of the country. All the Kenyans I spoke to were against any violence and were shocked and upset that any had occurred. The reaction of friends and family from home was that the whole of Kenya was at war, all taken from the media who completed exaggerated the troubles.
I would definitely recommend Kenya for an amazing holiday, it has so much to offer, a beautiful coast and National parks with very friendly people. I would go back tomorrow if I could!
Mar 08th 2008 – We’ve just returned from a 9 night visit (25/02 – 03/03) to Kenya with an overnight in Nairobi followed by four nights in each of Amboseli (Tortilis Camp) and the Masai Mara (Mara Explorer).
We had a great time! There was no sign of any trouble anywhere and we received the warmest of welcomes. In fact, our guide from Tortilis Camp, Joseph, was keen to talk about the recent turmoil in the country both to ensure we had a good understanding of the causes and to re-assure us that no tourists had been involved at all. Joseph, whilst working in Amboseli, is originally from Nakuru and therefore his family had been affected by the rioting there. On a walking tour from Tortilis our Maasi guide was also very open and he explained that there had already been some staff at the various camps and lodges “sent home” and unless bookings picked up soon, more would follow.
We were a little surprised, however, that we were the only people staying at the Mara Explorer, a beautiful tented camp set in a meander of a river in the Masai Mara. There was only three of us staying at the 10-tent site, being looked after by 10 staff. The normal complement of staff was 16, but luckily the other staff had been redeployed at the nearby sister camp (Intrepids). The service was impeccable and we were made to feel very special.
Whilst we were staying at the Mara Explorer the news came through that the “Power Sharing Agreement” had been signed and the smiles on the faces of our hosts were broader than they had been previously (if that were possible).
If you are thinking of a holiday in Kenya, please do not let the recent troubles put you off. Hopefully these are behind them now, and tourists appear to be safe and well looked after. It is the employees in the tourist industry that will suffer first from the lack of visitors to the country and they are all there, standing by to give you a great holiday.
In terms of the game viewing, in both Amboseli and the Mara we had a superb time. There were elephants galore in Amboseli, of course, but we also saw several lions and hyena. There was giraffe, zebra and wildebeeste galore. In the Mara, we reckon we saw something like 20-25 lions in total (in 4 days), a leopard (up a tree, looking very relaxed), several cheetah and every other animal you would expect to see, except a rhino, which gives us a perfect excuse to return.
Finally, a word of thanks to Robyn and her colleagues at Africa Sky. They put up with our regular enquiries about the updated situation in the country. We also found the regular updates on the website very useful. The organisation of all transfers was excellently handled by Gamewatchers Safaris.
We would certainly recommend Africa Sky to friends, family and anyone reading this comment.
Feb 08 2008 – I just want to thank you for all your support during planning of our holiday. We had a really good time, everything was fine and if of your clients are wavering about kenya as we did, I’d be happy to talk to them.
Please thank Benson and Ray from gamewatchers, they were marvellous and drove us around through the awful nairobi traffic with great skill!
Porini lion camp was great tooo, we had a lot of rain but saw more game in 2 days than we did in a week in botswana 2 yrs ago. It was sad that the camp was so empty, as was the plane and the hotel but great for us! Our guide steven at the camp was also great, and we were v well looked after.
Fumba beach was just the sort of place we would have chosen, so thank you also for advising this. The staff were lovely there.
My ony adverse comment was that the norfolk hotel was a long way from the airport but it was very nice and we upgraded to a suite! Sadly we werent there very long!
Anyway, thank you again for all your help, we will reccomend “africasky” to friends!