Lake Nakuru · With kids

Children aged 5 to 17, and students up to 23 with valid ID, pay USD 45 per 24 hours against USD 90 for adults. It is bought through eCitizen before you arrive, so have passport details ready when you book rather than at the barrier.

A National Museums of Kenya site between Nairobi and Nakuru: the excavation itself, an exhibition hall, a nature trail and gorge, and a picnic ground. The hand-axes here were found in 1928 and are dated to between 700,000 and a million years old, which lands well with children who like the idea of very old things.

Half an hour away at Lake Elmenteita, the conservancy permits guided walks through acacia down to the lakeshore and horse riding along it — neither of which the fenced park allows. Useful when a child has had enough of sitting in a car.

You may not leave the vehicle except at designated picnic sites, gates open around 6.30am and shut at 6.30pm, and the lakeshore circuit fills most of a day. Break it deliberately at the picnic sites and the escarpment viewpoints rather than pushing straight through.

Say this before you set off: the vast flamingo flocks Nakuru is famous for are much reduced, and a child expecting a pink lake will be disappointed. Pelicans, cormorants and fish eagles are still there in numbers, and the rhino are the reliable part.