Explorations Company: a Kenya safari adventure beyond the expected

(Image credit: Nicole Lovett)

published 15 January 2025

I am so close to a lion that I can hear the snap and crunch of bones as it eats its kill. I've been told the carcass lying in a muddy puddle in front of me was once a male buffalo, but with little more than a ribcage and spine left, I'll have to take my guide's word for it.

Having arrived by light aircraft on the world-famous Maasai Mara only minutes ago, it's fair to say – as a mainly city person, frankly – that I am astonished to be confronted with the sight of two young lionesses finishing off the gristly remains of a two-day-old kill, as a male with a shaggy, golden mane looks on. With their faces smeared with both mud and blood, the two enjoying their lunch look almost comically gruesome. I can hear their sighs and pants as they gnaw through bone. Nearby, opportunistic jackals are biding their time, waiting for their chance to steal a bite of the buffalo. I should probably be terrified. Instead, as I sit in a jeep only a short distance away from the scene, I am totally transfixed.

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Life at Roca River Camp, just a 45-minute flight from Nairobi, flows along with the continual hum of the African bush. Mornings unfold beneath sprawling acacia trees, where hearty al-fresco breakfasts are accompanied by an unusual dawn chorus – the resonant grunting of hippos wallowing in the nearby Mara River. Hosted by Ross and Caro Withey, whose roots in Kenya are life-long, this luxurious retreat offers more than just proximity to one of Africa's most iconic safari destinations.

From July to October, the camp provides front-row seats for nature's greatest spectacle: the Great Migration, when millions of wildebeest, zebras, elands and gazelles surge northward from the Tanzanian Serengeti in search of greener pastures. Yet even in November, outside the migration window, the Mara's drama seems to unfold continuously. And the guests at Roca River camp are witnesses to it thanks to Roca River’s expert guides – such as eagle-eyed local guide Julius Naurori – who seems to have an almost uncanny ability to spot lions from staggering distances.

Perhaps slightly easier to spot were the elephant herds shepherding playful calves through quiet groves, and the giraffes loping gracefully across the horizon. Rarely seen – thankfully – are other visitors. Indeed, perhaps the most precious gift of a November visit is the sense of solitude on the Mara. While peak season can bring a parade of vehicles to each sighting, Ross and his team have perfected their timing, ensuring Roca's guests are often the first, and frequently only, witnesses to these remarkable wildlife encounters. In the quieter months, the Mara belongs to the animals and the rare few eager enough to seek them out.

The fund's initiatives include an innovative project supporting local women in producing reusable sanitary pads – a seemingly simple intervention that ripples outward, addressing broader issues of female empowerment, education retention, and economic independence in Maasai communities. Guests at Roca River Camp can arrange visits to meet these remarkable, pioneering women, and witness at first hand how tourism's pounds and dollars can flow beyond game drives and sundowners to nurture meaningful community projects.

Behind all these extraordinary scenes lies the meticulous planning of Explorations Company, whose team has spent over three decades weaving together the threads of wildlife, culture and conservation across Africa, Asia and beyond. Long before "impact-led travel" became a fashionable idea, Explorations Company has been arranging ultra-luxurious adventures around the globe with the aim of giving back to the countries they are visiting. "Most people feel better when they know they're making a positive contribution, especially while enjoying themselves on holiday," says Explorations Company founder Nicola Shepherd, calling such an approach the "very essence of sustainable tourism".

Speaking to Kate, it's clear that what sets Explorations Company apart is its unwavering commitment to purposeful, transformative travel. That means more than just selecting luxury accommodations – though the camps and lodges they partner with are undeniably exceptional. Instead, it's about creating connections that touch Kenya's local communities as well as its wildlife. Each camp and lodge in the portfolio has been carefully vetted not just for comfort and location, but for their tangible contributions to conservation and community development. Otherwise, Kate tells me definitively, they're off the books.

Like Kate, each expert at Explorations Company has lived and worked in the destinations it operates in, which also includes Latin America and (particularly excitingly) Antarctica. It means they have the kind of expertise that can't be gleaned from guidebooks or websites, but from years of forging relationships with local communities, conservationists, and wilderness experts across continents.

The result is an unparalleled black book of contacts on the ground with visitors, for example, able to meet with top conservationists like Brian Heath, who has led conservation efforts at the Mara Conservancy for more than 20 years. And this deep regional knowledge also leads travellers away from well-worn paths to discoveries like the Shompole wilderness – still largely untouched by tourism.

Guests here can visit the rangers, and are invited to learn about the important community and wildlife protection work they do. Among these impressive guardians is Sylvia Nashipae, who broke barriers as Shompole's first female ranger. Today, she is one of 12, their presence challenging traditional gender roles in their communities while strengthening the bonds between wilderness protection and local communities.

At Lion's Bluff we are treated to night drives which reveal a world hidden to safari-goers who explore only in the sun. Our spotlight catches movement in the grass, and we see an African wildcat, one of the continent's smallest and most elusive predators, freeze mid-hunt. We pass giraffes gently grazing in the dark (others appear to have mastered the trick of sleeping standing up), and later a barn owl emerges, its eyes glowing from within the grasses of the wilderness.

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Sorcha Bradley is a writer at The Week and a regular on “The Week Unwrapped” podcast. She worked at The Week magazine for a year and a half before taking up her current role with the digital team, where she mostly covers UK current affairs and politics. Before joining The Week, Sorcha worked at slow-news start-up Tortoise Media. She has also written for Sky News, The Sunday Times, the London Evening Standard and Grazia magazine, among other publications. She has a master’s in newspaper journalism from City, University of London, where she specialised in political journalism.