Reviews of Namiri Plains Camp
(97%) From 29 travellersThey do not necessarily represent the views of Expert Africa.
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Privacy on the Plains
Tucked away on the Plains, Namiri Camp was another excellent spot from which to experience the wide open vastness of the Southern Serengeti and the Kopjes which lie within. We were rewarded with good sightings of Lion and Cheetah. The grasses were high in anticipation of the arrival of wildebeest and zebra from further south. Where Olakiri sightings could be busy the seclusion of Namiri Plains made for very private viewings. An old guide friend of ours from Nairobi describes this are as his 'church'. I can see what he means.
If you head west toward Seronara and the Western Serengeti the sightings are 'radioed' in and so get extremely busy, a bit of a mud bath after any rains.
Nice to have both indoor and outdoor showers, the latter being a double.
Namiri Plains Camp review
Loads of big cats, but everything is extremely spread out so on most game drives you may go an hour or more without seeing that much. We had many cheetah, lion and leopard sitings as they promote. The facilities are nice but getting dated, they're building a more permanent lodge to open Summer of 2019.
Read more about the whole safariExcellent game drives at Namiri Plains.
A comfortable camp situated in the plains well East of Seronara.
As with the other camps, the facilities are good, the staff friendly and helpful, the tents and communal areas comfortable and the food good. My only reservation was that the light level at dinner was so low I could not see what I was eating, probably a function of the solar power so could be excusable.
Patena the guide was also a good spotter and knowledgeable about the game and birds.
All the game drives were very good indeed.
Namiri Plains Camp review
Another of our favorite camps and parks! Our guide Khahil was terrific and the wildlife sightings were fantastic.
We really enjoyed the camp manager Diana and the rest of the staff. Again, the food was so delicious.
We had developed colds and had to share a jeep with a loud talkative couple, so on our last afternoon we decided to slow down, get out of the jeep, and take a walking safari. It was such a good experience, finished by gin and tonics with the rest of the guests in the bush.
Namiri Plains
We saw so many lions, but many males were emaciated because the migration had not yet returned to the Serengeti. Out our front porch we could watch a heard of 15-20 elephants (including babies) frolicking in a spring. What a daily site.
We saw a good number of cheetahs, females with cubs, and males with a very recent kill. We also had perfect opportunity to see leopards close up, including a female with two cubs licking the blood from a wildebeest carcass hauled up a tree.
Our driver even heard about a black rhino and drove like hell to successfully show us. When we could get a good photo, our driver was very good about taking our camera and delivering a magnificent photo. Once we were surrounded by a pride of 21 lions all around our land cruiser. It wasn't scary at all, our driver seemed to sense the animal moods quite well. I was impressed that the sleeping lionesses didn't even twitch an ear, when the driver started up again. We liked the surprises of the sun-downer. Once we were following a pride of two lionesses and cubs, we got ahead of them at a small pool they were headed towards. When they came to drink we are all shocked when a hippo rose out of the water and warded them off. There was an alpha male lion nearby nursing a face wound, the females came over and licked him.
Namiri Plains Camp review
A first rate experience. The camp was comfortable, staff helpful and food delicious. The star of the show was the guide Patena who managed to locate animals as if by magic - the knowledge and skills of the guides never ceases to amaze. The hot water bottles for the morning drives were very welcome, and breakfast 'out' perfect. It's relatively remote location meant we saw few other vehicles, which was one of the things I wanted to avoid. I would heartily recommend and am keen to visit their women only staffed camp.
Read more about the whole safariNamiri Plains Camp review
Great food. Excellent staff. Really like the campfire sitting and watching the sunset.
The communal dining was fun. Enjoyed talking with other guets. Liked the lunch right next to the tent, and out by a tree overlooking the plains. Fantastic location away from it all.
One of the highpoints was the parade of elephants going through the camp while we were eating lunch. Beautiful sunsets. Fun drive from the park entrance to the camp.
Amos really ran a well organized camp.
Home of the Big Cats
Namiri Plains is located in a remote southeastern section of the Serengeti, and the camp itself is far from any other camp. This provides for excellent game viewing opportunities early and late in the day when other vehicles must leave the area to head back to their respective lodges. The camp is lovely, with each tent separated from others providing privacy. The common area is simple and inviting. It appears that the camp will be relocated next year, and new tents and commons will be constructed. Camp Manager Diana and Asst. Mgr. Amos made us feel at home. Staff was very friendly and attentive and food was excellent. Out guide, Walter, did a great job finding game and putting us in the right spot for viewing it.
Cheetah were not as easy to spot as we had hoped, although we were fortunate to see a mother and 2 cubs. Lions however were everywhere! Two large prides are nearby, and each pride has several males in a coalition. In back to back game drives we saw a total of 46 lions!
The open plains are spectacular, and the vistas go on forever. The wildebeast migration had moved north, but there were still thousands of gazelle around, as well as zebra, hartebeast, topi, eland, and other antelope.
If you want to experience the Serengeti without the crowds, Namiri Plains is the place to go!
Namiri Plains Camp review
Namiri Plains is a quite peculiar place to go on safari, it can be the best place ever or a "meh". It all depends upon what you are looking for - to me it's THE place to be for my safaris, and this was my 3rd visit but please read further.
Honestly speaking, I would not advise this camp for travellers on their first safari trip ever, because the area does not offer the whole variety of wildlife you can encounter in central Serengeti. So if you visit Serengeti and you go straight to Namiri Plains, you might be disappointed because you see very little or sometimes even totally zero elephants and giraffes, and absolutely no hippos, and in general smaller numbers of all the common African wildlife that you expect to see and to photograph on your first safari trip, for which on the contrary the Seronera area is highly recommended, where the same company Asilia runs a very very comfy camp called Dunia, famous for being the one and only completely run by women (btw I had the big luck of having one of their lady guides driving me up to Namiri and SHE ROCKS!!). That said, you will wonder why go to Namiri Plains? Because Namiri is where the big cats roam. So if you are fond of (or like me slightly obsessed with) big cats, and you only want to see cats, and to hear cats all night and dream of cats and breathe cats and end up with all your memory cards only full of cats striking any kind of pose .. then a stay at Namiri is something you cannot miss.
Many highlights of my recent stay. First of all cheetahs, cheetahs and more cheetahs, all beautiful, looking healthy and well fed, literally thriving, was what made my heart sing. among the many, a cheetah mother appearing out of the blue that we followed to the den discovering that she had newborn cubs...Then, we have been under a real cuteness-overload attack with the local lion pride displaying repeatedly the 14 cubs of different ages very very near the camp (and there will be more coming in the next months, because I have seen at least 4 different couples of honeymooners mating). And furthermore, spending quality time with two leopard cubs was a super treat.
One remarkable thing, this year, was the weather. The green season is always a dare, because April and May are the months of the Long Rains, but this year I think I have seen 4 seasons in the same day. After the terrible drought of the past 2 years, April 2018 has been overly generous with water... so Serengeti was all lush green and in bloom, but also super muddy. Please keep that in mind if you thiink the chance of getting bogged somewhere is part of the fun and adventure; but if you don't want to deal with mud skip the green season and go for the dry one. The rains have visited us also during my stay (half may), with usual 30-minutes downpours in the hottest hours except one day, when we had like in 2 hours the amount of rain they usually have in one week .. The camp staff however handled the unexpected situation with the usual, lovely all-Tanzanian hakuna-matata attitude. Please notice anyway that every tent is provided with rainboots and umbrellas, so you don't have to worry about packing those things .. travel as light as possible: a safari is a good chance to practise a bit of declustering.
The rain season however has ist perks, and the main one is the Great Migration. More than a million wildebeests on the move, wandering around in pursuit of the rainbs and the best grass to graze. When the Migration comes, the plains are covered in black dots up to the horizon and it's not rare to have herds in the camp. One day I even had the fun of watching thousands of wildebeest running in front of me while I was sitting in my tent. Another morning I enjoyed my wakeup-call cup of tea sitting outside in the good company of a family of elephants (unique event) who were grazing the tender leaves of the thorny acacia in front of my tent. Not to mention the honor of hearing lions roaring every night while I was in bed: the coming of the Migration is a sort of Big Cats Xmas Time, that is well described as "feeding frenzy" ending up in very happy, very full-bellied cats.
No need to say, I absolutely want to go back and stay again at Namiri.
Authentic bush experience with cats galore
Numerous cheetah sightings, lions and a leopard with cubs was the icing on the cake.
We were lucky enough for the migration to pass through and saw cheetahs attempting to hunt on several occasions. Our guide was excellent and went out of his way to make sure we found what we were looking for.
