All You Need to Know Before Booking!
Our trip to the Masai Mara in November 2025 was amazing! We got to stay right on the property boundary of the national park with the ability to walk on a bridge from our lodge, and hop in a safari vehicle to start our wildlife viewing game drives. Bonus to that, we stayed at this property for almost completely free due to Marriott Bonvoy points we had accumulated. You can do it too!
See our Youtube video about the trip here! https://youtu.be/gwkkNmcMxIQ
There are so many safari lodges all around Africa, it is hard to know which ones to choose in which country, let alone in one park. The Masai Mara National Reserve, Kenya’s premier safari destination, is famous for the Great Migration of over a million wildebeest and zebras, its abundant “Big Five” (lion, leopard, elephant, rhino, buffalo), and its “spotted” savanna landscape dotted with acacia trees, named by the Maasai people who share the area. Bordering Tanzania’s Serengeti, it’s a crucial part of a larger ecosystem, offering incredible year-round wildlife viewing and rich cultural experiences with the Maasai.
We are Marriot loyalists due to the perks we earn with elite status (we are Titanium). In order to maintain our status we have found that choosing a hotel chain and taking advantage of the perks that can be earned with frequent stays and earning credit card points for one brand is the best bang for our buck.
We chose the JW Masai Mara because we were able to book our stay entirely on points meaning that all we had to pay for was transportation to and from the lodge and the park fees that are not included with your stay in order to go on game drives. This was a heck of a savings for 5 nights totaling about $7,000 in value.
To get to the reserve, they offer two modes of transport that can all be arranged through the JW directly. One is a road transfer (about a 4-5 hour drive to/from Nairobi) and the other is a plane transfer (about a 30 min to 1 hour flight) to/from the Nairobi-Wilson airport which is in a different part of Nairobi than the international airport Jomo Kenyatta. You can also arrange an air transfer directly through the company Safari link and you will pay a bit less than you would if you have the JW arrange it for you. Both are fairly costly and we did one mode each direction. If we were to do it again, we would recommend an air transfer both ways. It feels long in the car after 5 nights of safari drives and spending a lot of time in the car already.
Tip: If you stay at the JW Marriott in Nairobi, they will hold your bags there for safari since weight for the plane transfers is limited to 15 KG total. Most of us visiting Africa probably are coming with large bags way over that limit so it is a nice way to be able to store them safely and bring only what you need for your safari stay.
Upon arrival we were greeted by the staff with welcome drinks and taken to check-in. The lodge sits right on the edge of the Masai Mara park and so you will see lots of animals from the lodge itself (baboons, birds, antelope, etc). The JW even has their own Hippo Pool that you can see resident hippos across the way (they sometimes try to come into the lodge area as well at night)! All of the “hotel rooms” are safari tents and ultra luxury. Since this is an all-inclusive lodge, there will be drinks and snacks in your room at all times. There is an indoor and outdoor shower as well as jacuzzi tub that you can use on your deck. Most of the tents face the river to see the animals as well. The bed and sitting area are also very comfortable.
The only downside is there is no AC in the tents, only fans. At night, it cooled off quite a bit but during the day it was roasting hot inside. The downside is this is the time of day you have to relax, take a nap, get some work done, etc. and with it being really hot inside the tent, it is almost impossible to do just that. We hope they will solve this in the future for the prices that this lodge goes for per night.
One of the biggest perks of this hotel is getting to use your very own Canon camera to take photos on safari. This is an AMAZING benefit to offer at a safari lodge and as you can see in both our video and photos, we got some GREAT shots. There is a small “camera cleaning” charge added to your bill at checkout that might be nice if they communicated ahead of time but it was about $25 USD so we felt it was worth it. There are two staff members there that will work with you every day after safari to go through your photos, help edit some, and give you tips and tricks on taking better pictures throughout your stay.
The staff is a major highlight at this property as all are very accommodating for anything you need. Breakfast, lunch, and dinner are served at the main lodge and usually consist of menu choices and themed dinners. Sometimes you will eat out on the reserve for a breakfast or two and then eat in the boma for dinner at least one of your nights. They do try to coordinate several meals in the bush with the entire lodge which can take up your morning or evening game drives so keep that in mind if you really want to spend lots of time looking for animals versus just the overall experience.
Each day starts with an early morning wake-up call and you will coordinate with your driver on whether you will be eating breakfast before you go, when you get back, or out in the bush ahead of time. You can get coffees at the bar to go out on the game drives if you are not eating beforehand. This lodge is unique in the fact that you can stay out all day if you want to on a game drive or come back after a few hours. Most of the time safari vehicles are private, or you may share with one other room during your stay but if they checkout, you will not have to share with new people coming in.
If you are only going out for a morning drive, you will return somewhere between 11 AM – 2 PM and then you can sit down and eat lunch. In the afternoon you can lounge by the pool or utilize the spa which has a sauna, steam room and cold plunge (the temperature is cool, not cold) if you package includes that. Or, you can relax in your room if it isn’t’ too hot.
Evening game drives start around 4 PM and go until about 7 PM when the game reserve wants everyone out of the park and back to their lodges. Dinner is served upon return from the evening game drives and then you rinse and repeat!
There are add-on activities you can do like visiting the Maasai village, going for a hot air balloon ride, etc. that are all extra costs outside of the all-inclusive experience. We did not partake in any of those so don’t really have an opinion on whether you should or shouldn’t. We wanted this portion of our trip to feel somewhat relaxing and sometimes adding on all of these extras can make it feel busy and take away from spending time looking for animals which to us, is the main point of going on safari!
Overall, we would recommend the JW Masai Mara lodge for your safari in Kenya, especially if you are able to book with points! (Who doesn’t love FREE safari??!!). The service and staff were great, the animals were amazing (we got to see the Big 5 in one day!) and the food and drinks were tasty.
If you are considering a time of year, we might suggest going between rainy and non-rainy season. We were definitely on the backend of the dry season and it was quite brown and they were doing controlled burns to help with new vegetation growth which made for not so great air quality some days. It was off-season with less guests overall so it is definitely a trade-off on what you would prefer.
Also, the Masai Mara is HUGE compared to other parks we have been to and there is A LOT more driving around the park to find different animals. That is partially why game drives can be all day or many hours. The roads are not super well maintained so it is definitely bumpy (not great for those with health problems).
Feel free to reach out to us if your looking for more information on how to point hack and get the most out of your travel and adventures. Wherever you decide to go and stay, make sure that you are enjoying and making the most of your trips and time exploring the world.
MC Exploring 