Explore Kenya – Escorted Women’s Safari
- 12 Days
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- Kenya
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- Small Group Tour
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- Wildlife Safari
Trip summary
- Duration
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12 Days
- Departure Date
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- June and November
- Travel Style
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- Small Group Tour
- Group Size
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- 4-10 Guests
- Destination
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- Kenya
- Experience Type
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- Wildlife Safari
For women who wander! It’s time to take a walk on the wild side on this all women, locally escorted safari in Kenya!
The expert team at Bench Africa has curated an exclusive small group tour with women in mind – an immersive 12-day safari escape incorporating wildlife, culture and adventure, and welcoming women of all ages. What's more, it’s locally escorted and there's no single supplement for anyone travelling solo!
Immerse yourself in 12 days of wildlife on this classic Kenya safari. Travel by rail to Tsavo East National Park to witness ochre-red elephants in their herds. Experience vast savannahs against the quintessential backdrop of Kilimanjaro in Amboseli, the spectacular scenery and birdlife of Lake Naivasha and Lake Nakuru and the iconic Masai Mara – one of the most wildlife-rich safari areas in Africa.
Travelling with women on a safari offers a unique opportunity to connect with other adventurous, passionate travellers while experiencing Africa's incredible wildlife and landscapes. With a female guide, you'll have the chance to gain new insights into local culture and traditions, and travelling with women can create a sense of camaraderie and support that enhances the entire experience.
Whether watching a stunning sunset over the savannah or sharing stories around the campfire, you'll create memories and friendships that will last a lifetime.
This safari was designed for women who wander. So, whether you're a solo traveller looking for new connections or a group of friends seeking an adventure to remember, consider joining this female-led safari.
Inclusions
- Hotel/Game Lodge/Tented Camp
- 11 Breakfasts, 11 Lunches and 10 Dinners
- Local Drinks on Safari
- Game Drives
- Game Walks
- Bead Work Lesson
- Cooking Class
- English Speaking Driver
- English Speaking Female Guide
- 4X4 Vehicle
- Scheduled Train Trip
- Emergency Air Rescue
Trip itinerary
On arrival at Nairobi Airport International Airport, you will be met by a local representative and transfer to your hotel. Your guide will meet you at the hotel this evening to introduce herself and provide a rundown of the schedule and be available for any questions you may have. Dinner tonight is at your own account.
Accommodation: 1 night Crowne Plaza Hotel or similar.
Located at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport and designed to offer a luxurious and elegant experience with unmatched security within the most protected zone in Nairobi. The hotel offers 144 spacious, adaptable, contemporarily designed rooms, with a large ergonomic working area consisting of suites, interconnecting rooms, double and twin rooms, convenient for business, family and leisure travellers.
With its convenient location, less than 3 minutes from the terminals, the hotel caters to transiting international and domestic passengers adding tranquillity and comfort to your travel experience. No traffic, no delays and no hold ups thus guaranteeing seamless transition to your flight on time, every time.
An early start means that you will collect a breakfast pack from the hotel before being met at and transferred to Nairobi Train Station. The train departs at 08h00 and arrives at Voi Train Station, the closest station to Tsavo East at 12h05 where you will be met by your driver to begin a game drive in Tsavo East National Park enroute to your camp. After lunch, enjoy an afternoon game drive ending with a sundowner. (BLD)
Kenya Railway Journeys – Please be aware that there is limited assistance on the Kenya Railway for boarding, disembarking or help with luggage. At both Nairobi and Mombasa boarding is level, directly from platform to carriage, but at the country stops you are required to navigate narrow stairs down to the platform and can be tricky with baggage. Seating is reserved and a valid passport is required to book the service and you will need to show your identification when entering the main train stations prior to departing. The train is kept clean during the journey and you are welcome to take food and non-alcoholic beverages on board with you but there is a dining car for first class passengers to purchase refreshments.
Accommodation: 2 nights Satao Camp.
Nestled amongst trees and surrounding a central water hole, the semicircular layout of the camp provides an excellent viewing point for each of the guests. Satao Camp has 20 tents, all en-suite, thoughtfully positioned to ensure a full view of the camps “own” watering hole. The 20 tents are made up of 16 family tents and 4 suites each tent is constructed of sisal and boroti poles topped with a makuti roof, only the front of the tent is visible as each tent has its own patio with table and chairs.
The tents are exquisite; all are attractively furnished with locally made beds and unique African designs. Each spacious tent has a private bathroom with running water. The shower however is in the true African style, whereby the camp staff bring hot water in the evening. The bathrooms are very spacious, slate floors with stunning wooden framework, the wash basins sunken into the structure, all fitted with flushing toilet.
Enjoy a day of game drives in the Tsavo East National Park. (BLD)
Tsavo East National Park -
A national park in Kenya with an area of 13,747 km2. It was established in April 1948 and covers a semi-arid area previously known as the Taru Desert. Together with the Tsavo West National Park, it forms an area of about 22,000 square kilometres. The Tsavo River flows west to east through the national park, which is located in the Taita-Taveta County of the former Coast Province.
The sight of dust-red elephant wallowing, rolling and spraying each other with the midnight blue waters of palm-shaded Galana River is one of the most evocative images in Africa. This, along with the 300 kilometre long Yatta Plateau, the longest lava flow in the world, make for an adventure unlike any other in the Tsavo East. The park forms the largest protected area in Kenya and is home to most of the larger mammals, vast herds of dust –red elephant, Rhino, buffalo, lion, leopard, pods of hippo, crocodile, waterbucks, lesser Kudu, gerenuk and the prolific bird life features 500 recorded species.
After breakfast, you will drive to Tsavo West National Park with a game drive en-route. Visit the Mzima Springs and then you will continue to your camp for lunch. Enjoy an afternoon game drive. (BLD)
Tsavo West National Park -
“Land of Lava, Springs, Man-Eaters & Magical Sunsets”
From the sight of fifty million gallons of crystal clear water gushing out of from the under parched lava rock that is the Mzima Springs to the Shetani lava flows, Tsavo West is a beautiful, rugged wilderness. The savannah ecosystem comprises of open grasslands, scrublands, and Acacia woodlands, belts of riverine vegetation and rocky ridges including the Poacher's Lookout where visitors can see the teeming herds in the plains below. Tsavo West offers some of the most magnificent game viewing in the world and attractions include elephant, rhino, Hippos, lions, cheetah, leopards, Buffalos, diverse plant and bird species including the threatened corncrake and near threatened Basra Reed Warbler.
Accommodation: 1 night Severin Safari Camp.
Being very close to the wonderful Kenyan nature, experiencing dawn and dusk with its astounding array of colours, listening to the voices of the wilderness, being one with yourself - the Severin Safari Camp offers all that and much more. In the heart of Tsavo West National Park they have created a place which reflects their deep bond with the country. In the camp amidst the African wilderness, our guests will experience a unique combination of adventure, recreation and wellness, a very individual service and culinary delicacies.
The Camp is constructed in an elegant natural design. The tents and suites are designed with wooden furniture in a traditional African style. Light and warm colours make for a cosy, familiar atmosphere. Each of the 27 tents and suites offer the view over the beautiful African landscape with its wild animals which all come to use the water holes without constraint both during the day and night.
This morning after breakfast, you will continue your journey with a game drive en-route to the Elerai Conservancy. Arrive in time for lunch followed by an afternoon with the Masai ladies for a bead making class. (BLD)
Accommodation: 2 nights Elerai Camp (or similar).
Elerai Camp is located in a quiet, unspoilt, unique setting on a 5000 acres private conservation area 12kms south east of Amboseli National Park at the foot of Africa’s largest mountain, Mt Kilimanjaro. The camp looks over Amboseli National Park and Mt Kilimanjaro, giving you what is arguably the best location of any camp in the area.
The camp offers 12 tents and 5 suites. Each tent has its own en-suite bathroom with solar hot showers and a toilet with a view. Raised cedar wood floors, acacia poles and makuti (thatch) roofing complement the surrounding environment. Large balconies with relaxing day beds combine to offer the perfect place to lie as you take in the ambiance when relaxing.
The elegantly furnished suite rooms have large sliding doors that open out onto your own private veranda overlooking the plains below and Amboseli National Park. Elephants, giraffe’s and zebra are seen most days from the comfort of your room. Designed using natural rock and acacia wood, the bathrooms have their own naturally crafted bathtub and shower which is unique to Elerai.
Enjoy a full day in the Amboseli National Park with a picnic lunch. (BLD)
Amboseli National Park -
Formerly known as Maasai Amboseli Game Reserve, is a national park in Loitoktok District in Kajiado County, Kenya. It is 39,206 ha (392.06 km2) in size at the core of an 8,000 km2 ecosystem that spreads across the Kenya-Tanzania border. The park protects two of the five main swamps, and includes a dried-up Pleistocene lake and semiarid vegetation.
The park is famous for being the best place in the world to get close to free-ranging elephants and has views of Mount Kilimanjaro, the highest free-standing mountain in the world.
Amboseli National Park offers some of the best opportunities to see African wildlife because the vegetation is sparse due to the long, dry months. The protected area is home to African bush elephant, Cape buffalo, impala, lion, cheetah, spotted hyena, Masai giraffe, Grant's zebra, and blue wild.
Enjoy an early breakfast before driving via Nairobi with a stop for lunch at the Karen Blixen Coffee Gardens. You will then continue onto Lake Naivasha where you will spend an afternoon at leisure. (BLD)
Accommodation: 2 nights Lake Naivasha Sopa Lodge.
Set in one hundred and fifty acres of grassland studded with Acacia bushes and trees, the resort is not only home to resident giraffe, waterbuck and both Vervet and Colobus monkeys, but it is also a night stop for the hippos when they leave the lake every night to come and trim the grass on the expansive lawns.
With Sopa’s traditional and conscientious care for the environment, they have carefully positioned all the buildings on the property so as not to fell any of the many trees there. As a result of this, they had to come up with a radically innovative and artistic design for the main public area building which now snakes its way between the trees with long and graceful curves.
It is also why you might well ask just why the two swimming pools with a children’s section and a pool complex with its bar, snack kitchen, pizzeria and health spa; tennis court; two conference halls with their four differently sized meeting areas, and stables are so widely set apart.
Morning at leisure. After lunch, you will enjoy a boat ride across the lake to Crescent Island for a game walking safari. Later return to the lodge. (BLD)
Lake Naivasha -
A freshwater lake in Kenya, outside the town of Naivasha in Nakuru County, which lies north west of Nairobi. It is situated in the Great Rift Valley. The name derives from the local Maasai name ɛnaɨpɔ́sha , meaning "that which heaves," a common Maasai word for bodies of water large enough to have wave action when it is windy or stormy. Naivasha arose from a British attempt to pronounce the Maasai name. Literally, Lake Naivasha means "Lake Lake."
Lake Naivasha is at the highest elevation of the Kenyan Rift valley at 1,884 metres in a complex geological combination of volcanic rocks and sedimentary deposits from a larger Pleistocene Era lake. Apart from transient streams, the lake is fed by the perennial Malewa and Gilgil rivers. There is no visible outlet, but since the lake water is relatively fresh it is assumed to have an underground outflow.
The lake is home to a variety of types of wildlife including over 400 different species of bird and a sizable population of hippos. The fish community in the lake has been highly variable over time, influenced by changes in climate, fishing effort and the introduction of invasive species. The most recent shift in the fish population followed the accidental introduction of common carp in 2001. Nine years later, in 2010, common carp accounted for over 90% of the mass of fish caught in the lake.
After breakfast, you will drive past the extinct Volcano of Mt Longonot and Suswa into the homelands of the Masai. The Masai Mara located on Kenya’s southern border with Tanzania, constitutes the northern stretch of the Serengeti and has the richest concentration of animals in Kenya. After lunch at your camp, you will have the opportunity to observe the unique world of the Masai Mara. (BLD)
Accommodation: 2 nights Mara Sarova Game Camp.
Sarova Mara Game Camp is located in the heart of the Masai Mara Game Reserve in South West Kenya. It is set on an elevation surrounded by two streams.
The Camp is uniquely laid out over the sprawling grounds that include rolling manicured greens, a virtual mini forest of indigenous shrubs and exotic trees, a large pond stocked with fish, mini bird sanctuary and an authentic Masai village adjoining the camp. The camp includes 20 club tents, 51 standard tents, 2 family tents, a main restaurant, bar and many bush dining options. The swimming pool has its own pool bar.
Today you will spend the day game viewing. Return to your Camp for lunch followed by an afternoon cooking class with experts from the camp. (BLD)
Masai Mara National Reserve -
Located in south west Kenya it is a vast scenic expanse of gently rolling African savannah plains measuring 1510 square kilometres in area and bordering the Serengeti National Park in Tanzania to the south. Masai Mara is a unique wildlife conservation haven famous for its spectacular natural diversity of wildlife and is the premier Kenya Safari location in East Africa, offering visitors numerous reasons to visit this animal paradise. Large numbers of Lions, Cheetah, Elephant, Rhino, African Buffalo, Wildebeest, Giraffe, Zebra and many more animals are found in the park in their natural habitat, unconfined and free to roam the vast Kenyan wilderness stretching for miles on end.
It is no surprise that tourists from the world over travel here to experience a Masai Mara Safari tour, more so as the reserve has been voted one of the new Seven Wonders of the World. Regarding the origin of the name, the word 'Masai' comes from the Maasai tribe, nomadic inhabitants of the area and the word 'Mara' is their word for 'spotted', referring to the ubiquitous flat topped acacia trees, shrubs and bushes that dot the landscape across most of the reserve.
Today your journey will take you straight to Lake Nakuru. The park boasts a good number of rhinos as well as a large population of leopards. Enjoy lunch at your Lodge followed by an afternoon game drive in the park. (BLD)
Lake Nakuru National Park -
Lake Nakuru is one of the Rift Valley lakes, located at an elevation of 1,754 m above sea level. It lies to the south of Nakuru, in the rift valley of Kenya and is protected by Lake Nakuru National Park.
The lake's abundance of algae used to attract a vast quantity of flamingos that famously lined the shore. Other birds also flourish in the area, as do warthogs, baboons and other large mammals. Eastern black rhinos and southern white rhinos have also been introduced.
Nakuru means "Dust or Dusty Place" in the Maasai language. Lake Nakuru National Park, close to Nakuru town, was established in 1961. It started off small, only encompassing the famous lake and the surrounding mountainous vicinity, but has since been extended to include a large part of the savannahs. Lake Nakuru is protected under the Ramsar Convention on wetlands.
Accommodation: 1 night Lake Nakuru Sopa Lodge (or similar).
Located on a range of hills that form the western limits of Africa’s Great Rift Valley, the lodge offers spectacular views over the vastness of Africa. The lodge also overlooks Lake Nakuru and its surrounding National Park, one that is a paradise for bird watchers and wildlife lovers alike. Lake Nakuru National Park is mainly a wooded and bushy grassland with a wide ecological diversity and characteristic habitats that range from the lake waters to the escarpment and ridges.
Your day will start with an early morning game drive through the Lake Nakuru National Park. After breakfast, you will drive to Nairobi where you will enjoy a lunch at Karen Blixen Coffee Garden and then a transfer to Nairobi International Airport for your onward flight. (BL)
Please note: On day of departure we recommend booking flights around 18h00 from Nairobi.
Accommodation: End of the Tour
Trip Gallery
Disclaimer: The images highlight both included activities and optional experiences, designed to inspire you to tailor your safari. For full details, please refer to the experience inclusions.
What our customers say
2025 Kenya ladies tour was an amazing experience, highly recommend this tour to anyone thinking of a once in a lifetime journey. Opportunities to travel with like minded strong women with intrepid spirits and a great sense of fun & adventure. Our guide and driver were incredibly knowledgeable as we bombarded them with questions. The animal safaris were life changing, observing them in their own environment and discussing the ways to preserve these habitates for these magnificent creatures, going forward. Our group were accomdated in some extraordinary tents and cabins, while the hospitality of the people was priceless Thankyou Bench, Southern Cross tours and importantly the diverse and generous "ladies" on tour, you made this tour so memorable
Suzanne Langford
The Kenya ladies only tour was excellent in every way. Accommodation, animal watching safaris, food, service were all of a very high standard. Operated by Southern Cross Safaris, they have touring down to a fine art. Our lady guide and driver ensured that we were kept safe and well informed. The days were mostly taken up with game viewing but there was some leisure time as well as shopping.
Estelle Hobbins
I loved it!! We were on the go everyday, which i loved. The accommodation was way more than i expected, beautiful, comfortable and the views i had, especially of Kilimanjaro, were spectacular. I had to pinch myself everyday that i was in Kenya! I had many 'moments' where i was overwhelmed with emotion, seeing a male lion, or lionesses eating a kill or a Cheetah family, a thrill that nothing compares. The Kenyan/Maasai people are the most hospitable, beautiful people I have EVER encountered in all my trips overseas and in Australia. The culture so different, yet speaking to the women, we have the same ideas and issues all over the world, which is a valuable, soulsister connection we share. The Maasai Mara was INCREDIBLE, wildlife was in abundance as was the other places we visited. Everywhere we visited was a highlight, yet Navaisha is so beautiful, however we spent one night, but it truly deserves to be a 2 night stay to take in and enjoy the grounds, the roaming giraffe, zebra, antelope, monkeys etc. and get some awesome photos of up close wildlife. Our guide Pesh, is an excellent knowledgable guide. With an friendly, caring outgoing nature, who can deal with diverse personalities, age and medical issues that may arise. Awesome woman. We had fantastic drivers, Sammy and Steve(now known as Stevo lol). Their knowledge of locations and wildlife knows no bounds, fun facts and the driving skills are incredible!! I met some lovely ladies and a couple i now consider friends, a privilege to have met them. Question is, would i go on another tour with BenchAfrica? Yes, i most definitely would, and so should you.
Sue Mugatu
Dates & pricing
Disclaimer
Prices shown are per person based on twin share. Seasonal supplements and minimum night requirement may apply. Solo traveller and extra night prices available on request. Luggage restrictions may apply. International flights not included.
Disclaimer
Prices shown are per person based on twin share. Seasonal supplements and minimum night requirement may apply. Solo traveller and extra night prices available on request. Luggage restrictions may apply. International flights not included.
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Explore Kenya – Escorted Women’s Safari

