Maasai Mara · Sports & events

This is a reserve on Maasai group land, not a town. The nearest organised sport is in Narok, about three hours away by road, and the nearest professional sport is in Nairobi, five to six hours away.

Camps are unfenced and lion and hyena move through them at night, so jogging is not an option in or around the reserve; the only legal way to be on foot is a guided walk with an armed ranger in a conservancy. People who come to Kenya to run end up in Iten, in the highlands hundreds of kilometres north.

Riding safaris operate on the conservancies and group ranches around the reserve rather than inside it. Almost all of them ask for genuine riding experience — you need to be able to move fast if something goes wrong — and there are few operators, so book a long way ahead.

Mara Serena runs a health club with a gym, sauna and steam room alongside a heated pool. It is unusual out here; most camps offer a plunge pool and a view, and nothing else.

The Mara and Talek rivers hold hippo and crocodile in numbers. Nobody swims in them and nobody fishes; camp pools are the only water you will get into anywhere in the ecosystem.