A gem that North Serengeti is

I just spent a month in Northern Serengeti at Lemala Kuria Hills Camp, and I must say there isn’t a better time to be in this location than during the quiet tourist season and also towards the end of the raining season. With most of the herbivores absent from the area, apart from a concentration on Lemai wedge, the area may look empty with little to offer. That is how the place looked when I first got here (though I like it like this anyway)

It wasn’t long before I got acquainted with the area that I started enjoying it. Birding in the area is amazing, and this being my hobby, I kept myself busy.

The nights were never quiet as I could hear lions and leopards roaring very close to our camp. In the morning I and my training colleague (Indi) with our guides students, we would go out and track the lions. Because the area has a lot of Kopjes, we would most often find our cats basking in the sun on the rocks.

With a lot of herbivores concentrated on Lemai wedge (the area of Serengeti north of the Mara river) this is where we would find all the cats, pride of lions, leopard and cheetah. On one morning we found 2 different mother cheetahs with cubs, one with 4 one-year-old cubs and the other with 3 cubs aged around three months. The fact that we were all alone for the one month made us enjoy the solitude moment, watching all these.

The scenery too in this location is great. From the view of Siria escarpment to the northwest to the “table mountains” (Turner’s hill and others around) to the north, in the Mara Triangle (Masai Mara game reserve)

Although the location is generally a good game country, it has for long been quiet with not much game viewing activities, as it was avoided due to difficulty of access, caused by lack of good tracks and the long distance from the accommodation facilities in the south. But his is changing slowly as the area has now been ‘’discovered’’ and a couple of camps put up and few other mobile ones during the migration, because the location offers spectacular wildebeest crossing viewing since the river here is wide and so shallow as opposed the narrow river with steep banks in some parts of the Masai Mara. Due to this, because of less danger of drowning or death from trampling on each other, crossings here can last for hours. But of course, there are crocodiles too and the have to eat!

I am leading a photographic safari into this location in late October 2015 and  July 2016.  Kindly get in touch if you would like to join these groups, on the following email address:

Paul.safariguide@gmail.com Also you can check on my other scheduled safaris  at  http://www.paulkirui-photography.com/safari/

A herd of Elephants would often come close to our lodge in the day

 Lemai pride

Lemai is a great location for cheetahs

Tried a new "trick" to create a zoom for my small camera using a pair of binoculars 

Kamau, looks out for some birds

Time for tea

A view of one of the rooms at Kuria Hills camp

Camp location with great view

 Kopje are common feature here

Had one afternoon of amazing rainbow view

Tried holding the rainbow in place

So whose footprints are these?

Tracking some of the game in the area

Trying my usual jump on a rock above the camp

 

Rapids on the Mara River

Getting stuck is normal here due to the soil texture

Miraji, coming with some rocks to use to get the vehicle out

The boys love getting dirty!

A view of Turner's hill from Lemai

A Wider section of the Mara river inside Serengeti

A leopard jumps down a tree on our approach