Kenya Chyulu Hills Camping Safari

Overview

Walk the Chyulu Hills — a 100 km chain of young volcanic cones and green ridgelines strung between Amboseli and Tsavo in southern Kenya, among the youngest volcanic fields on Earth and the landscape behind Hemingway's Green Hills of Africa. Guided by Maasai from the surrounding group ranches, you climb grassy craters with Kilimanjaro floating on the southern horizon, follow ridgetops through pockets of cloud forest, and descend into the lava underworld beneath the hills: the Kisula cave complex includes Leviathan Cave, one of the longest lava tubes in the world with over 11 km of surveyed passage. The wildlife experience is the walking itself — fresh elephant dung on the path recalibrates your senses in a way no vehicle safari can — and the conservancies here hold healthy lion, buffalo and eland populations. Nights are fly-camps or conservancy camps, and at over 1,800 m they are genuinely cold: pack a proper warm layer. June-October and January-February are the dry, reliable windows. Costs vary wildly with style — around £2,200 for five days at conservancy camps with guiding and conservation fees, several times that for the famous fly-in lodges. Access is 4-5 hours by road from Nairobi off the Mombasa highway.

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Prefilled for 1 January 2027 — the next best-season window. Search on partner sites — opens in a new tab.