11 Day Rwanda Gorillas – Kenya and Maasai Mara

This 11-Day Rwanda Gorillas – Kenya and Maasai Mara Safari starts in Kigali, Rwanda, and ends in Nairobi, Kenya. On this safari tour, you will trek out and explore Rwanda and Kenya, trek the endangered mountain gorillas of Rwanda, visit several places and National Parks in Rwanda and Kenya, including Kigali City and Volcanoes National Park in Rwanda, Nairobi City, Sweetwaters Game Reserve, Lake Nakuru National Park, and Maasai Mara National Reserve in Kenya. Come Explore Africa with us!

Safari Highlights:

Pickup from Kigali International Airport

Exclusive Kigali City Tour in Rwanda

Double Gorilla Trekking in Volcanoes National Park of Rwanda

Visit the Giraffe Centre and David Sheldrick Elephant Orphanage in Kenya

Encounter with Chimpanzee at Sweetwaters Game Reserve

Morning and Night Game Drives in Sweetwaters Game Reserve.

Game Drives in Lake Nakuru National Park

Exploring Maasai Mara National Reserve

Transfer to Jomo Kenyatta International Airport for departure.

A Detailed Itinerary:

Day 1: Airport Pickup from Kigali International Airport and a City Tour

Our professional driver guide from Arcadia Safaris will pick you up from Kigali International Airport upon arrival, greet, and brief you about the journey. He then drives you through Kigali City for a Tour. You will also visit the Genocide Memorial Site, where you learn about the history of The Rwandan Genocide, which took place between 7 April and 15 July 1994 during the Rwandan Civil War. In this, approximately 100-day period, more than 800,000 members of the Tutsi minority ethnic group and some moderate Hutu and Twa were brutally slaughtered by armed Hutu militias. Proceed for dinner and your overnight at a hotel of your booking.

Destination: Kigali
Accommodation Options:

• Meals Plan: Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner
• Drinking Water, Fruits and Wi-Fi throughout the journey

Day 2: Transfer to Volcanoes National Park and a Cultural Experience

After breakfast, you will depart Kigali for the scenic drive northwest toward the Volcanoes region, a journey of approximately two to two and a half hours. As you leave the city behind, the landscape gradually transforms from rolling hills and cultivated farmland into the dramatic volcanic peaks of the Virunga range.

On arrival in the Kinigi area, you will check in at your lodge and enjoy a relaxing lunch. In the afternoon, you will transfer to a nearby cultural village for an immersive cultural experience. Here you will be warmly welcomed by the local community and introduced to traditional Rwandan life through a series of guided activities. These may include traditional dance and song performances, demonstrations of local crafts and traditional medicine, and insights into the history and daily customs of the people who live in the shadow of the volcanoes.

This relaxed and interactive afternoon offers a meaningful connection with the culture of northern Rwanda. Afterwards, you will return to your lodge for dinner and an evening at leisure, allowing you to rest and prepare for the lifetime safari experience of Gorilla Trekking in Volcanoes the next day. 11 Day Rwanda Gorillas – Kenya and Maasai Mara.

Destination: Volcanoes National Park
Accommodation Options:

• Meals Plan: Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner
• Drinking Water, Fruits and Wi-Fi throughout the journey

Day 3: Gorilla Trekking in Volcanoes National Park

After an early breakfast, you will transfer to the park headquarters in Kinigi for a briefing on the do’s and don’ts of gorilla trekking. You will then be allocated a park ranger and assigned a gorilla family to track for the day.

The trek through the forest typically lasts between two and eight hours, depending on the location and movement of the gorillas. Along the way, you may spot a variety of bird species, including the long-crested eagle, stonechat, cinnamon-breasted bee-eater, grey-throated barbet, African marsh harrier, common moorhen, and paradise flycatcher.

Once the family is located, you will be allowed to spend up to one hour in their presence. During this time, you can observe these magnificent great apes as they go about their daily activities — feeding, resting, grooming, and interacting with one another, while the young ones play nearby. You are free to ask your ranger questions and take photographs to capture the experience.

Afterwards, you will return to your lodge for a well-deserved lunch. The rest of the afternoon is free for relaxation at the lodge. Prepare for your flight to Nairobi – Kenya the next day.

Destination: Volcanoes National Park
Accommodation Options:

• Meals Plan: Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner
• Drinking Water, Fruits and Wi-Fi throughout the journey

Day 4: Fly From Kigali to Nairobi at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport

After your breakfast, you will be transferred to Kigali International Airport for your flight to Nairobi, Kenya, at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport. On arrival, you will be picked up by our guide who shall be ready for you, after which you will be transferred to your accommodation in Nairobi for dinner and overnight city. 11 Day Rwanda Gorillas – Kenya and Maasai Mara.

Destination: Nairobi – Kenya
Accommodation Options:

• Meals Plan: Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner
• Drinking Water, Fruits and Wi-Fi throughout the journey

Day 5: Transfer to Giraffe Manor to Visit the Giraffe Centre and David Sheldrick Elephant Orphanage

In Kenya, after your wake-up on a fine morning, you will have up a delicious breakfast and then go to the Giraffe Centre. The place established in 1979 educates the school children about their country’s incredible wildlife and environment as well as their breeding programme of the endangered Rothschild’s giraffe. Here, you get extremely up-close with these tall species and get an opportunity to feed them since they love interacting with visitors. Later in the day, you can as well stretch your legs through a small nature trail within the sanctuary and then transfer to Elephant Orphanage in search for the white rhinos. Later return to your lodge for your dinner and overnight.

Destination: The Giraffe Centre – Nairobi, Kenya
Accommodation Options:

• Meals Plan: Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner
• Drinking Water, Fruits and Wi-Fi throughout the journey

Day 6: Transfer to Sweetwaters Game Reserve to Encounter with Chimpanzees

On Day 6; After breakfast you check-out and drive to Sweet-waters in the secluded heart of Ol Pejeta Ranch and Rhino Reserve. Here, these magnificent beasts are afforded sanctuary from those who would take their lives to sell their horns. The Jane Goodall Institute runs a remarkable Chimpanzee Sanctuary, where you go face to face with these primates.

Your camp also overlooks one of the busiest waterholes in the area and offers some amazing views of elephant, giraffe as well as a myriad of other plains game. This is Africa as Teddy Roosevelt saw it years ago when he led one of the first safaris to tour Africa in comfort and Splendour. Our tents at Sweetwater will remind you of this bygone era.

Destination: Ol Pejeta Conservancy – Sweetwaters Game Reserve
Accommodation Options:

• Meals Plan: Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner
• Drinking Water, Fruits and Wi-Fi throughout the journey

Day 7: Morning and Night Game Drives in Sweetwaters Game Reserve

On day 7 of your Adventure, you will have your delicious breakfast and then you will go for an early morning game drive through the reserve; you will have sightings of different mammal species, including the black and white rhinos, African Wild Cat, lions, Aardwolf, African Civet, Baboons, Beisa Oryx, Bohor Reedbuck, Black-Back Jackal, Bruchell’s Zebra, including possible sightings of the wild dogs among others. Later, you’ll be driven back to your hotel for lunch.

You will spend your afternoon relaxing and later in the evening, you will go for a night game drive with an armed park ranger and spotlight torches to help you see nocturnal in the night while hunting and feeding on their prey like African wild dog, Oryx, cheetah, lions, Jackson’s hartebeest, serval and bat-eared fox among others.

Destination: Ol Pejeta Conservancy – Sweetwaters Game Reserve
Accommodation Options:

• Meals Plan: Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner
• Drinking Water, Fruits and Wi-Fi throughout the journey

Day 8: Transfer to Lake Nakuru National Park with a Stopover at Nyahururu Town

After a leisurely breakfast on day 8 of your 11 Days Rwanda Gorillas- Kenya and Maasai Mara Safari, you will then drive to Lake Nakuru National Park which is about 4 hours from Sweetwaters game reserve. The journey will take you through the Great Rift Valley stopping at one of the highest Cities of Kenya, Nyahururu at an elevation of 7700ft.

You will then drive to Thomson falls, a 74m waterfall, which is located 3km away from Nyahururu Town, and upon reaching you will be impressed by the stupendous thundering of the waters which drop several hundred feet down into a fearful gloomy gorge. Later you will be driven to Lake Nakuru National Park, home for Pink flamingos lining beautifully in the middle of the Lake. You will then have dinner and later overnight.

Destination: Lake Nakuru National Park
Accommodation Options:

• Meals Plan: Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner
• Drinking Water, Fruits and Wi-Fi throughout the journey

Day 9: Morning Game Drive in Lake Nakuru National Park and Transfer to Maasai Mara National Reserve

On day 9 of your safari, you will have a sumptuous early morning breakfast and then set off on a game drive through the park that will present various mammal species before you, including waterbucks, impalas, warthogs, elands, lions, leopards, hippopotamus, giraffes, rhinos, among others. Afterward, you will proceed to Maasai Mara National Reserve, which will take about 5 hours including a lunch stopover enroute.

Destination: Maasai Mara National Reserve
Accommodation Options:

• Meals Plan: Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner
• Drinking Water, Fruits and Wi-Fi throughout the journey

Day 10: Full Day of Exploring Maasai Mara Game Reserve

After breakfast, you will spend the day in the Maasai Mara, one of the greatest wildernesses of the world! You will take part in a morning and afternoon game drive where you will see large numbers of wild game. Residents among the park are giraffe, eland, topi, and thousands of plains game including impala, zebra, and gazelles. While in the Mara, take an optional hot-air balloon ride or go fishing on Lake Victoria at extra cost. In the evening on your last day, you will attend a Bush Sundowner – a fabulous al fresco cocktail party overlooking the savannah at sunset. Dinner and overnight at your lodge.

Destination: Maasai Mara National Reserve
Accommodation Options:

• Meals Plan: Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner
• Drinking Water, Fruits and Wi-Fi throughout the journey

Day 11: Morning Game Drive and Transfer to Jomo Kenyatta International Airport

You will rise early and take off for your last sunrise game drive before returning to the camp/lodge for a proper sit down English breakfast. After breakfast you will check-out and drive to Nairobi where you will check-in the hotel for dayroom use where you can spend the rest of the day at your leisure or take part in some last minute shopping and sightseeing. This evening, you will be taken to the airport for your ongoing flight home.

Destination: Jomo Kenyatta International Airport
Accommodation Option: No (End of tour) Unless on Request

• Meals Plan: Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner
• Drinking Water, Fruits and Wi-Fi throughout the journey

PRICE INCLUDES

• Round Trip Airport Transfers (pick-up and drop-off)
• Private Transportation in 4×4 Safari Cars
• Meals Specified on a Full Board basis
• Accommodation with Ensuite Facilities
• Applicable Park Entrance and Activities Fees
• English Speaking Professional Driver-Guide
• Gorilla Trekking Permit Fees
• Fly-in from Rwanda to Kenya Nairobi
• All Hotel and Lodge Pickups and Drop-off
• All Applicable Taxes
• Bottled drinking water and Fruits while on safari
• Activities as stipulated in the Itinerary (except those stated as “optional”)

PRICE EXCLUDES

• Activities not mentioned in the Itinerary
• International Flight Fares (unless requested)
• Country Entry Visa
• Personal Travel Insurance
• Telephone Charges
• Laundry Services
• Bar bills and all Alcoholic drinks
• Souvenirs, Gifts and Tips
• Additional accommodation before and at the end of the tour
• All related medical tests and vaccinations

SAFARI COST: (Rates are Per Person)

We appreciate you choosing us. Let’s explore the wild together!