Great Migration safaris

The Great Migration is not an event with a date. It is a continuous circuit of roughly two million wildebeest, zebra and gazelle moving through the Serengeti–Mara ecosystem in response to rainfall, and where you should be depends entirely on when you can travel.

Late January to March is calving on the southern Serengeti plains around Ndutu, when several hundred thousand calves are born within a few weeks and predator activity is at its most concentrated. This is arguably the most reliable of all the migration experiences, because the herds have a reason to stay put.

From roughly July to October the herds are in the north, and this is the period of the Mara River crossings — the images everyone has seen. It is also the busiest and most expensive time of year, and the crossings themselves are genuinely unpredictable: herds can mass on the bank for days and then cross in minutes, or not at all.

The honest position is this: we place you in the right region for your month, use camps positioned to reach the herds quickly, and build in enough days to give patience a chance to pay off. No operator can promise a crossing, and any that does is selling you something it cannot control.