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The Nairobi Team Behind Kenya’s Safari-to-Coast Journeys
Sun & Safari is a Kenya tour operator built around one problem: joining a Masai Mara or Amboseli safari to a Diani, Watamu, or Lamu beach stay without the traveller managing two bookings, two companies, and two sets of transfers.
Our Story
Founded in the Masai Mara, Built Out to the Kenyan Coast
Sun & Safari was founded in Nairobi in 2015 by a group of Masai Mara guides and travel planners who kept meeting the same traveller: someone who had booked a Masai Mara safari with one operator and a Diani Beach stay with another, and lost the middle of their holiday to missed transfers, mismatched dates, and duplicated park fees between the two bookings.
The company was built to remove that seam. One consultant plans both halves of the trip — the safari and the coastal stay — as a single itinerary with one flight schedule, one point of contact, and one invoice. Between 2015 and 2018, that model expanded from the Mara alone to cover Watamu and Lamu, giving the team a full run of Kenya’s south coast to sequence against any safari route.
Every consultant on the planning team has travelled the routes sold on this site. When a consultant recommends a tented camp near the Talek River bordering the Mara, or a specific stretch of Diani over another, it is because they have stayed there and can compare it against the alternatives directly, not from a supplier brochure.
How the Company Took Shape
From One Land Cruiser to a Full Kenya Circuit
Sun & Safari’s founding guides came out of the Masai Mara’s private conservancy system rather than the national reserve itself — a distinction covered in detail in our Masai Mara conservancies guide. Conservancy guiding requires a closer working relationship with the Maasai landowners who lease grazing rights to the conservancies, and that relationship became the template for how the company still operates: local guides first, itineraries built around their knowledge of the terrain, and a share of every conservancy-routed booking returned to the community that hosts it.
The company’s second phase extended that same principle to the coast. Rather than reselling beach packages through a third-party coastal agent, Sun & Safari built direct relationships with resorts in Diani, dive and snorkel operators inside Watamu Marine National Park, and dhow captains operating out of Lamu‘s Old Town — the same direct-relationship model applied to a completely different part of the country. That coastal network is what allows a Masai Mara to Diani itinerary to run as one continuous booking rather than a handoff between two companies.
From there, the safari side of the business widened north and east: first into Tsavo East and West, which sit directly on the Nairobi–Mombasa corridor between the highland safari circuit and the coast, then into Samburu and Ol Pejeta in Laikipia, both a longer drive or a short charter flight north of Nairobi. Each new destination was added only once a guide on the team had worked it directly — the same rule the company still applies today.
What We Stand For
Our Mission & Values
The mission is narrow by design: sequence a Kenya safari and a Kenya beach holiday into one itinerary well enough that the traveller only has to think about wildlife, reefs, and sunsets — not logistics.
Honest, Local Expertise
Consultants state plainly when the Great Migration is unlikely to be in the Mara on a given date, when the long or short rains will affect a specific park, and which lodge is priced above its comparable neighbours. Every recommendation is checked against the best time to visit for that specific destination before it goes into a proposal.
Community First
Guides are recruited from the communities bordering the parks and the coast they work in — Maasai guides around the Mara and Amboseli, Samburu guides in the north, Swahili and Mijikenda staff along the coast. Bookings routed through Mara conservancies and community-hosted visits such as the Maasai cultural village immersion return a direct share of revenue to the host community rather than an intermediary.
Conservation Minded
Clients are routed through conservancies and protected areas that fund active wildlife protection — the rhino sanctuary inside Lake Nakuru National Park, the northern white rhino programme at Ol Pejeta, and the private conservancies bordering the Mara that cap vehicle numbers at any single sighting.
Safety Without Compromise
Vehicle fleets are inspected before each season, partner lodges and coastal resorts are checked directly by the team rather than taken on a supplier’s word, and a Nairobi-based line stays reachable for every day a guest is travelling in Kenya, on safari or on the coast.
Our Journey
A Decade of Bush & Beach Milestones
From a two-person operation with one Land Cruiser to a company built specifically around the Kenya safari-to-coast transition.
Founded in Nairobi
Sun & Safari opens with a single guiding team out of the Masai Mara conservancy system and one commitment: one itinerary, one consultant, no handoff between the safari and the beach half of the trip.
Coastal Network Complete
Direct partnerships signed with resorts and dhow operators from Diani to Lamu, completing the coastal half of every itinerary and enabling the first fixed Bush & Beach combinations.
Conservancy Partnerships
Guests begin routing through community conservancies bordering the Mara and through Ol Pejeta in Laikipia, directing booking revenue into local conservation and community programmes.
Meet the Team
The People Who Plan Your Journey
A small, senior team — every consultant has guided or personally travelled every route sold on this site.
Daniel Mwangi
Founder · Safari OperationsA former Masai Mara conservancy guide with 15 years behind the wheel, Daniel leads the safari side of the business and still runs the guide training programme each season, covering the Mara, Amboseli, and Tsavo circuits directly.
See a Daniel-led itinerary
Amina Hassan
Coastal ExperiencesMombasa-born and raised, Amina curates every beach stay, dhow itinerary, and Swahili cultural encounter the company sells, from Diani resorts to Lamu’s Old Town.
See an Amina-led itinerary
James Otieno
Senior Travel ConsultantUsually the first point of contact for new enquiries. James has personally sequenced more than 200 safari-to-coast transitions, including the Masai Mara + Diani and full Kenya safari + beach formats, without a missed connecting flight.
Start a proposal with JamesWhere We Operate
Every Region Behind a Sun & Safari Itinerary
The company works across five clusters of Kenya’s geography, plus one cross-border route into Tanzania. Each cluster is staffed by consultants who work that ground directly rather than a single generalist team covering the whole country from a desk.
Southern Safari Circuit
The company’s founding ground: the Masai Mara and its bordering conservancies, Amboseli beneath Kilimanjaro, and Tsavo East and West on the road to the coast. Most first-time Kenya itineraries start here.
Northern & Central Circuit
Samburu‘s dry-country species, the rhino conservation work at Ol Pejeta in Laikipia, the tree-hotel lodges of Aberdare, and the trekking routes on Mount Kenya — the ecological range most itineraries here don’t cover in one trip.
Rift Valley Lakes
Lake Nakuru‘s rhino sanctuary and flamingo shoreline, Lake Naivasha‘s boat safaris and Crescent Island walk, and the cycling and gorge trails of Hell’s Gate — all within two hours of Nairobi and often run as a standalone circuit.
Nairobi Gateway
Home base for the consultant team and the arrival or departure point for almost every itinerary. A half-day Nairobi National Park game drive is the standard way to use a layover before an international flight.
Cross-Border Migration Route
The Masai Mara and the Serengeti are a single ecosystem split by a national border. For guests chasing the Great Migration across a full season, the team runs a combined route rather than stopping at the reserve boundary.
Everywhere the Southern and Coastal Networks Meet
Because the Southern Safari Circuit and the Kenya Coast are both established networks rather than one-off bookings, they combine into fixed formats as well as fully custom trips — from a 7-day taster to a 14-day circuit running north to south before finishing on the coast.
Community & Conservation
How Bookings Support the People and Wildlife of Kenya
Two communities sit behind most of the company’s safari and cultural bookings: the Maasai, pastoralist landowners across the Mara and Amboseli ecosystems, and the Samburu, a related but distinct community in the drier north. Both lease conservancy land directly to tourism operators, which is the mechanism that funds both household income and wildlife protection outside the formally protected reserves.
The Maasai cultural village immersion is hosted directly by a manyatta bordering the Mara, with the visit itself, not a separate donation, forming the community’s income from that booking. The same principle applies to conservancy game drives themselves: a stay booked inside a private conservancy covered in our Masai Mara conservancies guide returns a land-lease fee to Maasai landowners whether or not the guest ever meets them directly.
On the conservation side, two of the destinations in the Northern & Central Circuit are built specifically around species recovery rather than general game viewing: Ol Pejeta Conservancy, which holds the world’s last two northern white rhinos under permanent guard alongside a chimpanzee sanctuary, and the rhino sanctuary fenced inside Lake Nakuru National Park. Both are included on standard itineraries rather than sold as an optional add-on, on the basis that a guest booking a Kenya safari should see where conservation funding is actually going.
Common Questions
About the Company & How We Work
Is Sun & Safari a tour operator or a booking agent?
A tour operator. Itineraries are built and managed directly by the Nairobi team rather than resold from a third-party wholesaler, which is why one consultant can adjust both the safari and coastal halves of a trip without going back to a separate supplier.
Does Sun & Safari only book safaris, or beach holidays too?
Both, and most itineraries combine them. See the full breakdown on the services page, or the fixed-length options on the packages page if a shorter, set itinerary suits your dates better than a custom one.
Which destinations does the team cover directly?
The Masai Mara, Amboseli, and Tsavo in the south; Samburu, Ol Pejeta, Aberdare, and Mount Kenya in the north and centre; the Rift Valley lakes; Nairobi; and the coast from Diani to Lamu — the full list is on this page under Where We Operate, or on the destinations page.
How does booking through Sun & Safari support local communities?
Conservancy-routed safaris return land-lease income to Maasai and Samburu landowners, and cultural visits such as the Maasai village immersion pay the hosting community directly rather than through an intermediary. More detail is above under Community & Conservation.
Can the team plan a trip that isn’t already listed as a package?
Yes — fixed packages and products on this site are starting points, not the limit of what’s bookable. Most itineraries the team builds are custom; start one through the trip planner.
What happens if something goes wrong during the trip?
A Nairobi-based line stays reachable for the duration of the trip, safari or coastal. Booking terms, changes, and cancellations are set out in our booking conditions and refund policy.
Ready to Meet Kenya Properly?
Tell us your dates and your destinations — a dedicated consultant will reply within one business day with a tailored bush & beach proposal.