I travel to East Africa regularly, but on this occasion my fiancée was joining me on one of business trips for a holiday. As part of my trip was already organised, a week in the Hilton Nairobi, we couldn’t just books a Thomas Cook type holiday so we needed to use the services of a local safari company. What really set Kenyan Adventures & Beyond Safaris apart was the English based contact, Anne Sanderson was able to respond to questions in the evenings by both email and telephone. This extra bit of customer services support really allayed our concerns, allowing us to book our Mombasa Holiday with a bit of peace of mind.

We arrived into Mombasa on Saturday at noon, and were met by Doc and one of his drivers at the Arrivals of the airport. After travelling for an hour or so, we reached the Diani Beach and Kenyan Adventures & Beyond Safari’s offices, where we completed the paperwork and paid our bill, before being transferred the rest of the way to our hotel.

Our Hotel, Neptune Paradise Village is what you would expect of a Diani Beach resort on the Indian Ocean; African style chalets, large open spaces dotted with shade giving palm trees, replete with both Black Faced Monkeys, and the occasional Colobus Monkeys. The rooms are comfortable, yet basic, with pleasant furnishings and sizable balcony, allow for a comfortable and relaxing setting. The social areas are also pleasant, four swimming pools, with two pool bars, and standard bars, and two restaurants.

On the Tuesday we where met by Patrick from Kenyan Adventures, who was our driver for the two day safari into Tsavo East, thankfully roads from Mombasa up to Voi are much better than I had previously experienced, with the roads properly tarmac-ed. Entering Tsavo East via the Bachuma Gate we embarked upon a three-hour game drive though the park. In the three hours we caught a glimpse at the wildlife in the park, seeing dozens of zebra, Thompson gazelle, impala and countless Elephants. This is really the place to come if you want to see Elephants, there a hundreds, all dusted in the characteristic red earth of the East-African savannah, you will see more elephants than you can imagine, you really don’t need to be David Attenborough or Simon King to get close to these mighty beasts, they are literally everywhere.

We continued our first game drive until about 13.00, where we stopped for lunch at Voi Wildlife Lodge, we checked in and then had atypical buffet lunch, watching the watering hole complete with zebra, waterbuck, and marabou stork. At about 16.00, we left the lodge for another game drive, more elephants and wonderfully a pride of lions. We finished our evening drive at about 18.30, just as the last of the suns rays were disappearing behind the neighbouring mountain range, after a quick shower and change of clothes we retired to the bar, and the restaurant, entertained by the nocturnal noises of the savannah, before collapsing asleep at about 9.30. Breakfast at 06.30, and then a game drive for about 4 hours, including giraffes, and more lion, including some cubs.

Leaving the park at about 11.00 we stopped for lunch at the Lion’s Rock Lodge, spectacularly atop of one of the mountains abutting the Park, great views, average food.

After lunch we returned to our hotel on the Diani Beach, exhausted with many wonderful memories of our Kenyan Adventures.

I have just come back from a safari in Voi - on the edge of both Tsavo East and Tsavo West. It was a fantastic experience - the drivers of our vehicles were so helpful. You do need to get up really early - about 5 am to catch the animals. We also went out at 4 pm each day. Kenya is a wonderful country, but so poor. They do so need tourism and will fall over backwards to give you a holiday of a lifetime. So many elephants, zebras, waterbucks, ostriches, baboons, a few lionesses with cubs . I really recommend a visit - take your malaria tablets though. Malaria is very prevalent and when I read a local newspaper I was appalled at the fact that they cannot afford the drugs to treat it. I am 74 years old - a widow - it was wonderful.

Well what can I say.... elephants, buffalo, baboons and lions before breakfast says everything about our visit to Tsavo East in August with a great safari company Kenyan Adventures. We also saw Leopard, Cheeta and Giraffe in the Park. A wonderful experience!