Reviews of Hell’s Gate (From 5 Acclaimed Safari Experts)

Expert

Ariadne van Zandbergen –

ZA

Visited: Dry season

Ariadne is a renowned African wildlife photographer whose work is featured in many well-known guidebooks and magazines.

9 people found this review helpful.

Cycling between animals – an experience not to be missed

Overall rating

3/5

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This scenic little park with its impressive cliffs makes for a nice daytrip from Naivasha. Although there are plenty of herbivores around, it doesn’t really compete with some of the more popular parks in Kenya. Aside from some buffalo, the park lacks dangerous animals and you are allowed to walk and cycle throughout. I found it amazingly exciting to cycle unguided through herds of zebra, giraffe and buffalo. You could even take a picnic along and you’ll feel like a character in ‘Out of Africa’.

9 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

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Philip Briggs –

ZA

Visited: Multiple times

Philip is an acclaimed travel writer and author of many guidebooks, including the Bradt guides to Uganda, Tanzania, Kenya and South Africa.

4 people found this review helpful.

Hike Or Bicycle Through A Valley Full Of Wildlife

Overall rating

4/5

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Protecting a long, scenic gorge hemmed in by tall burnished cliffs, this small park near Lake Naivasha stands out as the one place in Kenya where visitors can walk, run or cycle unguided in the presence of an exciting variety of large mammals. True, Hell’s Gate doesn’t offer a full-blown Big Five experience, but pedestrians are still likely to encounter buffalo, giraffe, zebra, warthog, baboon and a wide variety of antelope – a far more thrilling experience when you’re on foot than it is from a vehicle. The birdlife is also quite impressive, a particular highlight being the colony of Rüppell’s vulture that breeds on the cliffs (look out for the telltale white streaks on the rocks below their nesting sites). But it is the volcanic Rift Valley landscape that most impresses – ancient volcanic plugs, fuming hot springs and glassy obsidian rocks, all overlooked by the perfect cone of dormant Mount Longonot.

4 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

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Anthony Ham –

AU

Visited: October-November

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

4 people found this review helpful.

Hell’s Gate: Canyons and Gorges

Overall rating

3/5

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You certainly wouldn’t come to Hell’s Gate National Park, not far from the southern shore of Lake Naivasha in the Rift Valley, for the wildlife. The occasional buffalo is the only member of the Big Five known to stray within park boundaries, and otherwise you’ll have to be content with zebra, eland and giraffe. But I like Hell’s Gate for the chance to experience a different slant on the Kenyan wild – this is one of the few parks in Kenya where free-range walking or cycling is permitted. That liberating chance to walk upon the carapace of this ancient continent is alone reason enough to visit. But the scenery here is also pretty special, with sheer, red cliffs and sudden volcanic plugs rising starkly from the main valley floor. And if you follow part of the Buffalo Circuit that climbs the hills in the park’s east, you’ll be rewarded by fine views of Mount Longonot, a shapely Rift Valley volcano nearby.

4 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

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Stuart Butler –

UK

Visited: Multiple times

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

3 people found this review helpful.

Walk with Giants

Overall rating

4/5

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Hell’s Gate National Park is one of the more overlooked of Kenyan parks. On a standard two week safari it might, at best, be quickly tacked onto the end of a trip if time allows. This is a real shame because there are plenty of plains game (antelope, zebra, giraffe, buffalo, baboons and vervet monkeys and others), the scenery, a mix of classic savannah landscapes hemmed by impressive cliffs and volcanic plugs, is beautiful and access is quick and easy from Naivasha.

Unfortunately (but sensibly!), in most national parks you’re not allowed to get out of the vehicle and, if you’ve never been on safari before, you might be surprised to hear that spending days in a jeep on bad roads looking at animals can quickly get very tiring. What makes Hell’s Gate special is that this is one of the few parks that allows you to dump the jeep and walk or, better, cycle, with African megafauna. It’s an opportunity not to miss. The first time I went to Hell’s Gate was some twenty years ago. I’d only been in Africa a couple of weeks and so far had only seen animals from the safety of a vehicle. Suddenly here I was on a clanky old bicycle gingerly cycling past buffalo and wondering whether it was safe to cycle through the middle of a group of baboons who were blocking the road. I still recall the excitement and exhilaration of feeling that I was now a part of the food chain (there are very few large predators in the park so it’s highly unlikely that you really will become somebodies lunch). Today I still prefer to walk in the bush rather than view it from a car and so on every Kenyan trip I will always try to make time to visit Hell’s Gate. Other plus points for the park are that it’s an ideal family-friendly park and it’s considerably cheaper than many other parks.

3 people found this review helpful. Did you? Yes No

Expert

Lizzie Williams –

ZA

Visited: June

Lizzie is a reputed guidebook writer and author of the Footprint guides to South Africa, Namibia, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda and Zimbabwe.

2 people found this review helpful.

An easy walking and birding safari in an impressive coloured gorge

Overall rating

3/5

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Named for its pair of massive red-tinged cliffs, scenic Hell’s Gate lies next to Lake Naivasha. As there are no predators, you can explore on foot; I enjoyed the three-hour walk through the gorge which was lined with sheer cliffs patterned by striking and lustrous black and red volcanic sediments. There are numerous plains game in the park and I encountered cute little Thomson’s gazelle skipping through the grass and incredibly tame rock hyrax scrambling among the rocks. Additionally, it’s well-known for birds of prey and the likes of Verreaux’s eagle and Ruppell’s vulture can be seen hovering over the cliffs. It’s a great day excursion from a lakeside lodge but go early to best appreciate the magnificent colours in the rocks (and to avoid the heat).

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