Lake Bogoria National Reserve

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Expert

Anthony Ham –

Visited: Multiple times

Anthony is a photographer and writer for travel magazines and Lonely Planet, including the guides to Kenya and Botswana & Namibia.

3 people found this review helpful.

Lake Bogoria: The Flamingo’s New Home?

Overall rating

2/5

Wildlife:

Bush Vibe:

Scenery:

Birding:

The massed flocks of greater and lesser flamingos – up to two million in a good year – for years made this one of the best lakes in the Rift Valley to see one of Kenya’s most memorable spectacles. Honking in the shallows and all but concealing the alkaline lake’s waters, the flamingos for the most part stuck close to the shoreline of this 34km-long lake. At the time of writing the number of flamingos was fluctuating greatly from one year to the next. Check with your safari operator or another local source before making a visit here. If the flamingos are indeed present in large numbers, it really is a sight to behold and should on no account be missed. On the other hand, if the flamingos aren’t present, there’s very little reason to visit: thanks to growing human and livestock encroachment into the reserve, you’d be lucky to see zebra, impala or warthog, if indeed you see anything at all. The western shore is also home to hot springs and the largest number of geysers of any lake in Africa.

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Expert

Stuart Butler –

Visited: Multiple times

Stuart is a travel writer and author of numerous Lonely Planet guidebooks, including 'Kenya', 'Rwanda' and 'Tanzania'.

Sometimes Pink-Tinged Lakeshore

Overall rating

2/5

Wildlife:

Bush Vibe:

Scenery:

Birding:

Lake Bogoria is a tough one to review as so much depends on when you go and what the local weather patterns have been up to recently. Lake Bogoria is known as a holiday home for flamingos and, when conditions are right, up to a million birds can turn parts of the lake pink. At such times this is one of the spectacular wildlife sights in East Africa. In addition to the flamingos, the lake is characterized by bubbling, steamy hot springs and geysers.

When I visited in 2008 the park lived up to the hype with huge numbers of flamingos present. However, on my most recent visit things were very different indeed. In the two years leading up to this visit there had been a lot of rain, and water levels in Lake Bogoria (and in the beautiful neighbouring Lake Baringo) had risen considerably. The rising waters had drowned the hot springs and geysers, flooded the surrounding areas and the deeper waters had caused the flamingos to flee to waters more inviting. There were maybe 50 flamingos present in the park, possibly fewer. In addition to that the only other animals visible were the goats belonging to local villagers who had pretty much moved into the park. To make matters worse, the local council, which must surely have been aware of the complete lack of wildlife and the general dire state of the park, had taken the bizarre step of doubling the cost of entry for tourists!

However, don’t dismiss Lake Bogoria completely. Lake levels were slowly starting to fall and with luck the flamingos will start to return and the local council will get to work making the park a worthwhile destination.

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