SAMBURU

The essential and unpredictable waters of the Ewaso Ng’iro provide water to Samburu’s seminomadic tribes, their livestock, and its fascinating wildlife. This river carves through this scrub desert of dry savanna plains, thorny acacia trees, and tanned rocky hills. Its banks offer amazing vantage points to see wildlife drink from the water’s edge and to watch Samburu’s spectacular birds.

Kenya’s equatorial location creates little change between the seasons, and overall its temperatures remain fairly steady throughout the year. Samburu’s desert-like climate experiences higher daytime temperatures than the rest of the country, with cool evenings. Although there is some variability in the rains, Kenya typically experiences two rainy seasons throughout the year. The long rains typically last from April to May and fall as heavy rain showers. The short rains typically occur in November as intermittent, scattered showers.

Like its landscape, the wildlife in Samburu is raw, breathtaking, and captivating. Samburu’s unique beauty is reflected in the electric blue feathers on the vulturine guinea fowl, the stretched limbs of the gerenuk antelope, and the rounded ears of the Grévy’s zebra. Massive breeding herds of elephants and mighty tuskers swim and drink in the river as they meander through this arid landscape. Samburu’s minimal grass cover also makes for spectacular predator sightings. Previously diminished by poaching, poisoning, and habitat loss, populations of lions, leopards, cheetahs, and wild dogs have bounced back. This area’s highly adapted predators camouflage perfectly with this arid landscape and use it to their advantage while lurking along the Samburu’s lifeblood, the Ewaso River.