Wildlife Safari in Africa

Wildlife Safari in Africa

You think of wildlife safari and Africa rings in your mind, and within Africa, my choice was Kenya, an eastern African country. Do you want to go on safari too? Follow me on my journey.

Visa:

Kenya is among those beautiful countries where Pakistanis can get a visa on arrival or can opt for eVisa with three months validity. However, I preferred to arrange a visa beforehand to avoid the queues at the immigration. I didn’t have to visit the Kenyan consulate in Dubai myself; I just sent my passport along with the required document with the driver and same day got the visa.

Flight:

Being based in Dubai, I had several options at my disposal; including four direct flights daily from Dubai to Nairobi. My choice was Emirates Airline as it had a direct flight of almost 5 hours with the best on-air service.

Transport:

Taxis are readily available in Nairobi, and if you want to get adventurous, you can also try their public transport called Matatu. I used the taxi service from the hotel during all my stay.

Language:

Most of the people speak English as it’s their official language along with Kiswahili.

Currency:

Kenyan shilling is the national currency however dollars are accepted widely, and I made most of the payments with it.

Hotel:

Being capital of Kenya, Nairobi has many hotel options, and I searched and selected based on TripAdvisor reviews. I picked Sankara, Nairobi; it’s a 5-star hotel in the city centre and very convenient to shopping and restaurants. After my stay here for four nights, I can undoubtedly say that it’s a gem in Nairobi with superb services and helpful staff.  Worth to mention, hotel bed was very comfortable.

Familiarising Myself with Kenya

It was my very first trip to the African continent, and I loved every bit of it especially the weather. The hotel itself was excellent, even the evening view from room window was fantastic. Just on a two-minute walk from the hotel was Sarit centre which had shops, cafes and restaurants.

Food:

The first night, I had vegetarian dinner as I was not sure about Halal food. Next day I found that most of the restaurants use Halal meat, it was good news 🙂 If you are very particular about Halal food, I recommend that you always check with the restaurant staff if they have halal food. Kenya has a lot to offer to foodies from a variety of fresh juices to different meat cuts. I loved passion fruit juice and churrascaria. The breakfast at Sankara used to be awesome each day, every day with a lot of things to choose from. I checked on TripAdvisor for restaurant suggestions for dinner and decided Fogo Gaucho, as it was near to my hotel. It was a Brazilian restaurant and rated 4th best in Nairobi, although they had reasonable dishes in the buffet somehow I didn’t like it much. My search for the best continued until I found The Carnivores Restaurant.

It’s just superb. When I asked if they serve Halal meet, they showed me the certificate from the local council certifying that they use Halal meat. It was a four-course meal; before the main course, they bring you a flag and keep serving you exotic meat varieties such as ostrich, lamb leg and rack, sirloin, spare ribs, roast rabbit, chicken wings, skewered kidneys until you put down that flag. I was taken completely by surprise when one of the staff told me that they also serve crocodile meat.

After the main course, they served delicious desserts including speciality ice creams. I highly suggest trying their sorbets. I loved the ambience so much that even next day I again came here for dinner. Though it’s a bit pricey around 40US$, it’s worth every penny.

If you are a coffee lover, I recommend you to enjoy your cup at Java house; it’s Africa’s own coffee chain and best in Nairobi for hot drinks.

Nightlife:

Nairobi has a fair number of nightspots, just near my hotel, there were also some casinos, I visited all of these out of curiosity, but it failed to impress me. The rooftop bar on the topmost floor of my hotel, Sankara is quite famous, it also has a pool, and if you are shisha lover, you can also order that. I tried, and it was good.

Safari Time:

Situated near the Tanzanian border, I have heard that Masai Mara National Reserve is an excellent choice for a safari in Kenya, but I did not choose to go there since it was an almost eight-hour journey. Instead, I prefered to explore Nairobi National Park and getting there was quite more accessible, it is just a short drive from Nairobi’s business district. It cost me 100 U$ on a van of 8 people. It took almost one hour to reach the main entrance of the park. From there, we were transferred to a purpose-built vehicle to roam in the park.

Right at the entrance a giraffe welcome me 🙂

 

Continued our safari trip after the warm welcome.

Loved the blue sky and white milky clouds.

Though these are artificial but this park has diverse birdlife with over 400 species recorded.

Here I found some original birds but they were unable to fly.

From this point you get accomanied by park security, perhaps due to crocodiles and other wildlife.

 

 

 

 

All in all, I had a wonderful time and I recommend you to visit it this place. If you like the post don’t forget to share it with others.

 

 

 

.