Kenya: Dust, Grace, and the Space Between

You don’t go to Kenya to be a tourist. You go to be reminded.

Of scale. Of stillness. Of life moving at the speed of hooves, wind, and time-hardened hands. There are lions and migrations, yes—but there’s also a quiet behind it all. A pulse beneath the spectacle. And if you’re lucky, or open enough, Kenya lets you feel it.

I didn’t plan my trip like a safari brochure. I wasn’t there just to tick off the Big Five. I gave it three weeks—enough time to both move and stay, to let the country speak instead of trying to frame it in my lens. From Nairobi’s noise to the northern deserts and down to the coast, Kenya surprised me with its depth and steadiness.

Nairobi: Noise, warmth, and contradiction

Nairobi greets you sideways. One minute you're in a dusty traffic jam behind a herd of goats, and the next you're sipping craft coffee in a rooftop café that could easily belong in Berlin or Cape Town.

I stayed in Kilimani, in a modest Airbnb run by a young couple who gave me restaurant tips and warned me—only half-jokingly—about the city's infamous traffic. The city isn’t always beautiful, but it’s alive in that restless, hopeful way. One morning I visited the David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust, where orphaned elephants are raised with the kind of tenderness you rarely witness in this world.

Later, I had nyama choma and ugali at a roadside joint in Karen, shared with strangers who instantly turned to friends. One man told me, “In Kenya, you don’t ask if you’re welcome. You just sit, and you're part of us.”

That stuck with me.

Samburu: Dust, elegance, and the long silence

Most people head straight south to the Mara. I went north—to Samburu, where the land is drier, tougher, and altogether more humbling.

The landscape looks like it's been carved from bronze. Red earth. Scattered acacias. A kind of brutal beauty that sneaks into your bones.

I stayed at Sabache Camp, near the base of sacred Mount Ololokwe. Nothing luxurious—just canvas, campfires, and silence. The Samburu people live with a grace that makes you feel clumsy and overfed by comparison. I walked with a local guide named Lekupe who barely spoke above a whisper and yet somehow made the whole world slow down with a hand gesture or the way he studied a hoofprint in the dust.

We tracked elephants. We watched stars unroll like a blanket over the sky. And in the dark, when I couldn’t sleep, I just listened—to hyenas in the distance, to the quiet breath of the land, to the wind folding through the grass like a song.

Lake Naivasha & Hell’s Gate: Edges and echoes

Back south, I spent a few days near Lake Naivasha, a place where hippos graze lawns at night and the line between wilderness and garden is almost imaginary.

I stayed at Camp Carnelley’s, where the vibe is part backpacker, part bush camp. Think hammocks, cold beer, and monkeys that will absolutely steal your snacks if you’re not paying attention.

One day I biked through Hell’s Gate National Park—alone, unguided, past zebra, giraffe, and warthogs, through a gorge that looked like something out of a biblical story. No fences. No engine noise. Just sweat, dust, and the feeling that you were both out of place and exactly where you should be.

Masai Mara: Yes, it’s worth the hype

Let’s get this out of the way: the Masai Mara is everything they say it is. But what surprised me was how intimate it can still feel, if you do it right.

I avoided the mass-market lodges and booked two nights at a small eco-camp in the Mara North Conservancy—a community-run reserve where wildlife roams just as freely, but without the safari traffic jams. My tent had no Wi-Fi, no outlets. Just a bucket shower, a lantern, and a Maasai night guard who smiled more than he spoke.

We saw lions devour a wildebeest at dawn. A cheetah with three cubs walking like royalty through the grass. But the moment I remember best was a quiet one—watching elephants cross the river at sunset, the light turning everything gold and weightless. No one said a word. There was nothing to say.

The Coast: Dhow sails, Swahili stillness, and salt air

After the intensity of safari, Lamu felt like stepping into another time entirely. White stone, carved doors, donkeys for taxis, and the rhythm of the tide dictating your day.

I stayed at a guesthouse in Shela, where the call to prayer drifted over the water and women in kangas sold chapati from their stoops. Mornings were for swimming in the warm, flat sea. Afternoons were for reading, walking barefoot through alleys where nothing had changed in centuries, and sipping mango juice under fans that turned too slowly to matter.

There was a moment, aboard a wooden dhow under a lavender sky, where I remember thinking: I could stay here forever. And part of me still wants to.

Kenya taught me...

Kenya taught me that a country can hold both elegance and rawness in the same breath.

It reminded me that stillness isn't about the absence of noise—but about presence. That real connection comes from listening more than speaking. That beauty is often found on the backroads, not in the brochures.

I came to Kenya with curiosity. I left with gratitude. Not because it was easy—sometimes it wasn’t. Roads broke. Power cut out. Things took time. But that’s the thing: Kenya doesn’t care about your schedule. It moves at its own speed, and if you slow down long enough, it lets you move with it.

And I hope I never move quite the same again.