Kenya Airways

Kenya airways - What can you do in case of 27 – hours stopover in Nairobi

It wasn’t an original multistop return ticket but Kenya airways made it happened. I booked a flight from Dubai to Mahe, Seychelles (SEZ) with them. After the purchase a series of time changes were initiated on behalf of this flight carrier requesting non - stop to get my approval. The final result was that my return flight date from Seychelles to Nairobi was changed one day before my initial itinerary. At the same time the flight from Nairobi to Dubai remained unchanged. That meant 27 – hours stay in Kenya. I wasn’t upset, I didn’t argue about this change as I could spend less time on main island of Seychelles. Actually I was happy. All of a sudden I found myself in a situation to get most of classic safari destination like Kenya. Whatever I should decide my stay in Kenya should take just 1 day to complete. Note that a foreign citizen need a visa - either transit (USD21) or tourist (USD51).

Based at Jomo Kenyatta international airport as starting and final point of this adventure I identified next three opportunities for day – trip. These are ranged regarding underlying risk to get back to the airport on time for flight departure:
1 – a full day spent in Nairobi. In addition to visiting monument, museum, etc. in the capital of Kenya one should go on safari in national park in Nairobi outskirts and visit Sheldrick’s Elephant sanctuary and The Giraffe Park. It can be done easily in one day without significant risk of delays.
2 – day – trip to lake Naivasha or Nakuru. One can enjoy encountering many animals including rhinos, elephants, lions and many more. Lake Nakuru is very famous for its pink flamingo flocks but these exist in correlation of water level and salinity. If there are no flamingo flocks in Nakuru one should search them in lake Bogoria, around 50-km northwest. Lake Nakuru is like 2 or 3 hours drive from Nairobi, depending the traffic. There is a risk but it’s manageable with good planning as the roads are good in urban areas only.
3 – day –trip to Amboseli national park which lays in a savanna plain just beyond northern slopes of mighty Kilimnjaro. If one would like get most of it good glimpse toward Kilimanjaro and animals before the mid – day heat strikes) that means to get ready for entering the park when it opens at 6:00 a.m. for morning game drive. It’s 230 km from Nairobi and it takes between 4 and 5 hours drive one way. Here the risk is high as after the village of Emale it is offroad drive in dusty almost uninhabited wilderness to get to the park.

I chose Amboseli with ultimate request to have a night drive to Amboseli instead spending a night at any hotel in Nairobi. I found a local safari agency able to get me to the park entrance at dawn. This is the crucial to enjoy the mountain view and the wildlife. After 10:00 a.m. Kilimanjaro disappears in clouds and the animals hide in the bush seeking for shadow. Due to the huge distance, humidity, dust and even constant persistence of some clouds the crystal clear view toward Mount Kilimanjaro is not granted at all. I succeeded to be at right time on right place to enjoy animals roaming in the savanna with Kilimanjaro as a background.

I appreciate this change of Kenya airways in my itinerary as a gift to me to visit Kenya. Long stopovers should be utilized at most comprehensive way to add more exiting trips to the original planned vacations!