Amboseli National Park is a very special place on earth. It means “the place of water” in the Maasai tongue and indeed while the surrounding area is all red dust and acacia bushland the park stretches across vast, verdant swamps. They are fed underground by the runoff and snow melt from Amboseli’s imposing neighbor right across the Tanzanian border: majestic Mount Kilimanjaro. The view of the highest peak in Africa and the tallest free standing mountain in the world is in and of itself unforgettable reward for coming here. I am not much of a mountain climber but I have always dreamed of seeing Kilimanjaro. Ever since I read about this faraway and exotic land in children’s books, my distant dreams of Africa became morphed into this one iconic image: a snow-covered peak rising high above the savanna. You get the image, right? Now add to it elephants.

And I mean scores of them – whole herds roaming lazily across the grassland. From a distance they look like small dark spots on the vast blue and green canvas. But squint your eyes, get closer… Let’s just say that for an elephant lover like me Amboseli is pretty much as close to heaven as it gets.

Joseph Thomson, the first European who entered this area in 1883, famously asked, “How can such numbers of wild animals exist in such enormous herds?” Every visitor since has been asking the same question. Amboseli is reputed to be the best place in the world to see elephants and I definitely agree. I saw elephants in the wild before, but never SO many, so close, and in such a stunning natural setting. At one point a herd of something like a hundred animals crossed right in front of our jeep, totally oblivious to me standing with my mouth ajar and frantically snapping photos. Like these:

Although not the best place for checking off a list of the Big Five, given that the elephants (plus Mt. Kili) are the number one reason to visit, Amboseli is full of other wildlife. Declared a UNESCO Man and the Biosphere Reserve it is home to giraffes, cape buffalos, impalas, zebras, lions and more. These are some of my most memorable encounters:

Beyond animal spotting, Amboseli is also a great place to meet the Maasai tribe and visit a Maasai village. The Maasai lead pastoral lifestyle raising livestock and crops – but I’m guessing they earn most of their income from posing for pictures with tourists. I’m not really into that but still got a glance of the local life from a distance.

The trip to Amboseli was a childhood dream come true for me. Mount Kilimanjaro and the elephants – a perfect combo I felt I could never tire of. This short visit only fueled my long-term elephant obsession. As renowned Amboseli elephant researcher Cynthia Moss put it,

“Elephants are very special animals: intelligent, complicated, intense, tender, powerful, and funny. (…) I have always said that watching elephants is like reading and engrossing, convoluted novel that I cannot put down but I also do not want to end.”

Read on: