Location

Tsavo East National Park is easily accessible by air and road, and is approximately 160 kilometers from Mombasa, and 326 kilometers from Nairobi. The camp is in the park, on the banks of the Galana River overlooking the Yatta Plateau, 15 km upstream of Lugards Falls. Access:  By air, Galdessa is close to both the Malindi/Mombasa coast and the Chyulu Hills, which by private charter are approximately 35 minutes away.  The Camp is 1 hour's flight from Nairobi.  Galdessa has an all weather strip 15 minutes away but park entry must be first made at Manyani Airstrip from where clients are either picked up or can take off to the Lugards Airstrip once park fees have been settled. Manyani Airstrip is 30 minutes drive from camp. By road, the camp is easily accessible, 3 ½ hours from Mombasa and 4.5 hours from Nairobi.

The Background

Galdessa works closely with Kenya Wildlife Service with the black rhino re-introduction project.  Within Galdessa’s vicinity there are 51 black rhinos, Africa's largest  unfenced black rhino population. The camp has been built with great care not to adversely impact the environment and recycles its waste, uses solar power for electricity and has installed a water treatment plant. Galdessa's founder, Pierre Mourgue d'Algue, is a trustee of the TUSK Trust which works to protect the environment and habitats of Africa and distributes in excess of 90% of the funds it raises directly into the field.

Accommodation

Accommodation is in 15 comfortable and spacious bandas (thatched, semi-tented bungalows on wooden platforms) each of which has en-suite bathrooms, verandas and are situated a good distance apart to provide privacy. Three of the bandas have separate sitting rooms and aoneof them has a large veranda on stilts (Banda A).  Bandas A and 7 are often recommended for Honeymooners. The bathrooms are large and have traditional bucket showers, flush toilets and basins with running water.

Child-friendly

The lodge welcomes children.

Other facilities

Game Drives, nature walks and medicinal plant discovery. Tsavo East offers miles of open plains, bushy grassland and semi-arid scrub. What is more, once you depart off the few ‘beaten tracks’ that exist, you can explore one of the last remaining wildernesses on earth in almost primeval solitude.  Experience the real safari – morning and afternoon game drives through the park with our trained driver-guides. Picnic lunches and sundowners can be provided. 

The area is renowned for elephants particularly during the dry season; the last count (1999) recorded 8100.

Highlights and special features

• Game drives in open vehicles.  
• Walking safaris along the Galana River and sand rivers.   
• Sundowners, bush breakfast.  
• Rhino Camp (conservation project), 15 minutes from Galdessa. The camp's direct area is a home to over 51 black rhino.  

Tsavo East National Park is a Wilderness area and the game can be shy but it offers great bio-diversity.  Uncommon species seen there include lesser kudu, gerenuk, fringed eared oryx, hirola and Peter's gazelle. The area is renowned for elephants particularly during the dry season; the last count (1999) recorded 8100.  Tsavo is particularly rich in birdlife.

What the Press has said:

• Annabel Heseltine, The Mail on Sunday, September 1999   “ … I had been told of the beauty of Galdessa … and that the managers would do everything to make me comfortable … at Galdessa, the animals come to you.”
• Conde Nast Traveller, September 1999   “ … Galdessa is all about animals in every form.  In the days we had been at Galdessa we had seen so many animals … that it had begun to seem like a fairground in which everyone was a winner.”
• Travel Africa, Spring 2000   “Galdessa is not just another camp in which to relax: it directly involves you in the interest of wildlife conservation … the simple but very stylish and elegant decor is inviting … the food is exquisite … the staff, always looking after you, ensure a perfect service.”
• Lucia van der Post, Financial Times, July 1999   “There is scarcely a nicer place to be in the world than sitting on the deck outside your banda, looking at the southern sky and listening to the sounds of the African night.”
• Safari Style, Tim Beddow, Natasha Burns   “Red elephants, elegant Hirola antelopes, man-eating lions, and flocks of vividly coloured carmine make Tsavo their home, and tourism here is tightly controlled in order to preserve the area's unique mix of species ...”
• Galdessa is featured as one of Africa's top 10 lodges by Lucia van der Post for UK Vogue, January 1998.
• Selected as one of the world's top destinations for the Millennium and the only one in Africa by Harpers & Queen, January 1999.