Recommend October 2010 - (Page 28)

experiencing the high life in continued from page 26 KENYA “My luxury customers love the experience at the Mt. Kenya Safari Club in Nanyuki where they stand on the equator looking directly at Mt. Kilimanjaro at sunrise. Remember, for this segment it’s all about the once-in-a-lifetime experiences.” Eric Ardolino, Owner, A&S Travel them in the right direction.” Still, he adds, “I think that sheer luxury just for the sake of luxury, is really not what most people are looking for. I think they want a blend of luxury, but very comfortable luxury in the right location with the right wildlife and the right people.” Logan Stine, tour consultant for Sub-Sahara Africa at Cox & Kings, points out that Kenya is the perfect place for these new luxury clients seeking an “experiential” safari experience because of its unique combination of culture and wildlife. “That’s something that’s totally unique to East Africa—that cultural and wildlife interaction and if you go to the right places, you can get that experience, whereas Southern Africa is more focused on the luxury wildlife without the cultural aspect. That is one of the coolest aspects of East Africa.” Certainly, the three main areas all three of these luxury tour operators highlight on their safari itineraries are the Amboseli area in Eastern Kenya, the Samburu area in Northern Kenya and, of course, the Maasai Mara, home to the annual “great migration.” In Kenya’s Amboseli area—facing snow-capped Mt. Kilimanjaro located just over the border in Tanzania—all three operators recommend a unique lodge called Ol Donyo Wuas—Maasai for “spotted hills”—situated on the slopes of the Chyulu Hills, with exclusive access to a quarter of a million acres of one of the few remaining wilderness areas of East Africa. The lodge consists of nine individual cottages, each with an en-suite bath, electric lighting, an open fireplace, a centrally positioned dining area and a verandah with a panoramic view of the plains and Mount Kilimanjaro. Each suite also has an outdoor bedroom above the villa—a “star bed”—accessed by a set of winding stairs, which open on to a large deck with an outdoor bed, and seating where guests can, on request, sleep out under the stars. Each bed is appointed with linens, bedside tables with lamps and a mosquito net. In addition to a variety of activities such as game viewing by vehicle, on foot and on horseback, there’s still another unique feature guests love—the log jam hide. Basically, it’s a mass of heavy logs piled about five feet high and three feet thick, where guests are able to safely view wildlife at exceptionally close range at the lodge’s waterhole—almost like being a part of the herd. After a visit to the hide, guests learn so 28 october 2010 much about the wildlife, and elephants in particular, they’re able to watch interactions and movements closely. Indeed, says Cox & King’s Stine, “A big part of what really makes it a nice offering is that they have all these activities like horseback riding, mountain biking and they have these bloodhounds and they do antipoaching with these bloodhounds and you can actually go out with them and see how the bloodhounds work.… It’s one of my favorite places.” For a luxury tented camp experience in the region, there’s the Tortilis Camp located on the southern edge of Amboseli National Park, overlooking a natural waterhole and named after the nearby acacia tortilis trees, with an emphasis here on service and comfort. Each tent leads from a bedroom with an expansive king size or generous twin beds, through a dressing area into modern bathrooms with pressurized hot showers and flush toilets. Tents are raised up on wooden decks and sheltered by a thatched roof overhanging a large verandah. Here, guests can enjoy varied game viewing and follow the elephant herds from the luxury of open-sided Land Rovers, as well as enjoy walking game viewing with trained Maasai guides, bush breakfasts on the plains, and sundowners on top of Kitirua Hill. Here, too, guests can visit one of the Maasai manyattas, or villages, to meet the Maasai women and watch the Morans, or young warriors, dance. “Most of our clients prefer a balance between lodges and tented camps,” explains Ker & Downey’s Jones. “Because they’re in Africa and they’ve seen the romantic movie ‘Out of Africa,’ they have the romantic notion of the luxury tented camps that Karen Blixen was in with the fine china and silver setting and things like that. So, we like to do a combination of the tented camps and the lodge experience.… You can have both of those experiences. “And many times,” he adds, “we’ll do a private safari experience, we’ll do it exactly like Karen Blixen did. We’d have it totally outfitted; we’d set it up in a place like the private Lua wilderness area and it would just be the family in a private area with their own guide. They’re all en-suite—even though they’re mobile, the baths are all inside so you don’t have to go outside—and they get all the romance and the beauty of having their own private experience.” In Northern Kenya in the areas of Lake Tipia, Samburo and Laikiapa, there are also a variety of luxury lodges and tented camps, all of which are accessed by bush plane. In this region, the Loisaba Lodge is also a favorite of all three tours operators and is located on a 61,000-acre private reserve that doubles as a working ranch. Constructed from stone, local timber and thatch, the lodge is perched high on the edge of a plateau looking toward Mount Kenya and each room has large French windows that open onto a private deck cantilevered off the escarpment, affording breathtaking views. All the furniture in the lodge’s seven rooms—four doubles and three twins—is handmade at Loisaba and one room has a separate sitting room that can double as a bedroom for a family group. High-end clients should also know there’s a truly exclusive, selfcontained 2-bedroom, 2-bath private cottage built on the edge of the escarpment entirely from local stone and thatch with its own staff, game-drive vehicle and a private, cliff-top swimming pool, making it the ultimate hideaway. Guests also have access to a 6-passenger Eurocopter helicopter based at Loisaba on a private charter basis. The continued on page 30 recommend.com http://www.recommend.com

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Recommend October 2010

Editor's Notes/Agent Speak
Hotel Desk
Tour Talk
Luxurious India by Rail, Plane and Boat
The Heavenly Taj Hotels, Resorts & Palaces
Experiencing the High Life in Kenya
Savoring the North of England
Riviera Nayarit Travel Planner
Marival Residences & World Spa
Wildly Luxurious––High-End Vacations
The Ritz-Carlton, Grand Cayman Does it Again
Guadeloupe
Five High-End Villa Stays
Compagnie du Ponant's Le Boreal
Palm Beach: Playground for the Rich and Famous
Hawks Cay Resort, Florida Keys
La Costa Resort and Spa, California

Recommend October 2010