Visitors 5
Modified 8-Apr-19
Created 14-Aug-09
43 photos
Samburu is a national park situated about 6 hrs drive north by north-east of Nairobi (6 hrs by our standards - 10-12 hrs by Kenyan road standards). The roads to the park are absolutely terrible, you end up driving on the bush paths on either side of the hard pan.
The park is not small by any stretch of the imagination and is adjoined by another park (Buffalo Springs N.P.) The animals are free to roam from one park to another.
The area is in the central part of the Samburu tribal lands. The Samburu are a large tribe in numbers (rivalling the Masai) and were regarded as being fierce warriors back in the old days. They now have many of their people well educated and serving in many govt and private business capacities.
Samburu is in the northern section of Kenya, is very dry but there are a number of year round water holes and rivers in the area so animal life flourishes.
The lodge depicted in the photos is the Samburu Serena lodge. Wonderful place and even better now that it has been rebuilt. In the early 2000's a huge group of Somalie poachers came into the reserve from up north and the Kenyan army had to be brought in to roust them out. The ensuing battle took place around the Serena lodge area and resulted in a natural gas tank exploding. The blast leveled the main buildings and damaged a lot of the outlying structures. Everything has been rebuilt and is new so they are now back to the original opulence of the resort.
