The Wild Hill

“Every glance offers sweeping views of the Mara Serengeti Ecosystem, with shards of light shining through the clouds down from the heavens…”

Elevated, exclusive, exquisite and exhilarating, this incredible new private home sits on the peak of Kileleoni Hill at the very highest point in the Masai Mara. The Wild Hill combines luxury, sustainability, wellness and wildlife to create a transformative safari experience.

The Wild Hill accommodates up to 10 guests in 5 bedroom suites

Set atop a hill, facing south over the flat savannahs of the Mara North conservancies, this five-bedroomed private safari home is the smartest new place to safari in Kenya.

Why book Wild Hill? 

The Masai Mara Reserve is one of Africa’s most famous wildlife areas. Located in the south of Kenya, adjoining the Serengeti National Park in Tanzania, it’s best known for the world’s biggest wildlife migration, in which around two million creatures traverse the plains in search of fresh grass. To the Reserve’s north lie private conservancies – vast tracts of land owned by the Maasai pastoralists who have herded cattle here for centuries amidst prolific wildlife, from elephant and (well-protected) rhinos to healthy pride of big cats. Wild Hill is on a 45-hectare plot on the Mara’s highest hill, Kileleoni, overlooking these plains, offering all the wildlife and dramatic scenery of the Mara, but total privacy. Unlike the touristy reserves, here you will see wild creatures on your own – often without another car in sight.

Because this is a private safari home, not a lodge, owned by a fourth-generation Kenyan family, when you return, you have a sprawling contemporary hilltop villa with five bedrooms – each a little cottage with a private deck – to yourself. And because you’re the only guests, you can do what you like: play pickleball, spot birds in wild fig trees or colobus monkeys climbing rocks, have (complimentary) massages and facials in the spa, work off meals in the gym, or have breathwork and sound-healing sessions with its friendly wellness experts come house managers. With prices from $2,250 per person, based on six sharing the house, with private staff, high-spec vehicles, and private guides and therapists, there are few more spoiling spots for families or private groups to stay in East Africa.

The Backstory

Sir Michael Wood was a well-known East African farmer and one of the founders of the AMREF Flying Doctors service, which for over 70 years has taken medical help into remote communities. His grandson, Tarquin Wood, with his wife Lippa, has continued his legacy of working both with communities and the land by, in 2012, rewilding the family’s bean farm adjoining the wildlife land, buying up over-used grazing land around with the help of donors, and transforming the Enonkishu area into a wildlife haven. Having transformed their old farmhouse on the Mara River into the cosy House in the Wild Lodge and lured wildlife-loving donors who wanted private homes in the Mara region to buy plots and build smart villas nearby, the couple then embarked on building Wild Hill private house on the family’s 400-acre mountain plot, which with the philanthropic Sievwright family, they’ve opened as the Mara’s most glamorous contemporary bush house.

By charging each guest and homeowner $130 a night for the right to traverse three neighbouring conservancies, in 2023 alone, they planted over 30,000 trees. They raised over £190,000 for communities who previously relied only on cattle as well as providing jobs, training, livelihoods and education for thousands of Masai. Since they started rewilding in 2012, they’ve persuaded three other Maasai conservancies – owned by 700 Kenyan families – to join the scheme, opening up 45,000 acres in the northern Mara, dropping fences, stopping farming and charcoal burning and integrating good cattle-training programmes into the region. As a result, wildlife has returned. Only guests staying on those conservancies can traverse the region – offering a far more private experience than the Maasai Mara National Reserve to the south.

The Rooms

The three enormous one-bedroomed and one two-bedroomed, flat-roofed contemporary villas are perched atop a mountain, either side of an enormous double-height living-cum-pool area, with fabulous panoramic views over the plains. Like Wild Hill’s dramatically decorated central living space, each of the five “rooms” is more like a smart open-plan South African bush villa than a Kenyan wildlife lodge.

Within walls of charcoals, browns and creams, with glints of coppers and silvers, the South African interior designer Pullos Purdon, directed by the Sievwright family, has theatrically adorned spaces with decorative replicas from around the world: Chinese-style armchairs alongside mother-of-pearl Omani mirrors; Indian metal cow-heads with Zanzibar-style doors; faux-antique Persian carpets beneath bold black-beaded South African chandeliers; Nigerian statues by wallpaper featuring monkeys and tigers. It’s a bit like being immersed in a rather fabulous international design safari.

Amidst the pan-continental bits of decor are the sorts of treats one might find in the world’s best hotels. The giant beds are carefully made with bamboo-cotton linen and padded with feather toppers; the shower gels are finely fragranced by Africology; the kitchen cupboards are filled with treats from home-made crisps and Macadamia nuts to good teas and an espresso machine. For cold nights, there’s a fireplace and hot water bottle in bed and a bath ready to be filled with herb-fragranced salts. On hot days, sinuous loungers are arranged on the deck, so guests can lie back in the shade and watch hundreds of birds flit about in the trees or, if they’re lucky, colobus monkeys chatter in the trees while sipping a cold glass of South African wine.

Food and Drink

Vegetables are grown in the Woods’ community garden, the Wild Shamba, in an area in the valley set aside for community empowerment projects, so the fruit and veg couldn’t be fresher. When I stayed, a chef hadn’t yet been appointed. But the plan is to offer flexible meals made with local produce, from fish from Mombasa and inventive salads to fire-cooked steaks barbecued in a stone boma under the stars. The dramatic bar, at the heart of the living room, is stocked with wines and liquors from around the world, and the bar staff happy to conjure inventive cocktails from the Kenyan Dawa (made with honey and lime) or uncork a fine wine.

The Area

The Masai Mara to the south is one of the world’s best-known safari destinations. As a result, its plains are often crowded, and wildlife sightings are sometimes surrounded by as many as 100 vehicles. By comparison, the conservancies around Wild Hill can only be traversed by the handful of camps and hotels in the area. So, the game is extremely relaxed, and sightings are often totally private. Because cattle are still herded here, grazing areas are strictly rotated, the grass is richly manured, and the landscape is well-maintained, attracting increasing numbers of grazers – and, following them, big cats.

The Service

The camp only launched in July 2024, so the staff – 80 per cent from local villages – are in the process of being trained. Each was friendly, keen to learn and happy to relay how much tourism was changing their lives – which is the point of this camp. The new South African managers, Solveig and Dave Stein, who previously managed Shinta Mani Wild in Cambodia, understand the high standards expected by high-fliers – and have training programmes in place. The most expert of the staff were the therapists Maria and Faith, whose unbelievably strong hands soon unknotted lumps in my back, after two weeks of being rattled about across Africa in safari vehicles.

Who comes here?

Wealthy families and groups of friends wanting a bush house to themselves, and groups who value privacy and the flexibility to do whenever they want when they want. It will no doubt become a hotspot for philanthropists who want to get involved in conservation projects and families who enjoy seeing communities in action: perhaps going out with goat and cattle herders, visiting beading groups and schools, or learning about rewilding. Those who enjoy night drives and photographic expeditions will enjoy the freedom to go out on to the conservancy day and night and to go off-road on safari.

For Families

Buffalo, lion and hyena often roam up the hill, and there are various high decks, steps, pools and ponds, so although children are welcome, they have to be well supervised. (Childcare can be arranged with prior notice.) The variety of indoor and outdoor living areas offers lots of space for different age-groups to relax in privacy. Wifi and a library with a TV allow those who want to catch up with the world to do so.

Sustainability

The structures were built using local stone excavated from the mountain and have living roofs, so the buildings almost disappeared into the mountain. Electricity is generated by solar (with a backup generator), and rainwater is filtered from tanks up the hill (or trucked in when supplies are low). Fruit and veg are grown, where possible, from the Wild Shamba, and eggs and milk are brought from Tarquin’s parents’ farm. A daily fee of $130 a guest is paid to the community, which helps keep the area wild and provides a living to the Maasai landowners. An additional $30 donation allows guests to visit the rhino sanctuary at the foot of the hill – which helps pay for the protection of these endangered creatures.

Accessibility

The Ngerende airstrip is a 45-minute drive away, and Nairobi is a 45-minute chartered flight from there. The house is set on the side of a steep hill, and rooms are accessed on rocky paths and steps, so a degree of mobility is essential. There are several very high decks on which small children must be supervised.

Is it worth it?

This is an expensive bush home to take over if there are two or four of you – as the minimum rate is $13,500 a night. But if you have a full house, it’s good value compared with many other high-end bush lodges – particularly given that just about everything is included, from spa treatments and sound-healing sessions to bush picnics and drinks. Because the local community benefits financially from visitors, the more people who stay, the more that Maasai landowners will see the benefits of conservation – and agree to add their land to the ever-increasing rewilding projects and wildlife conservancies.

Ultimately, it’s a really spoiling bush villa: a luxurious hilltop home in which you could just hang about at the end of a safari, lying by the pool, playing pickleball, having spa treatments and sipping cocktails. Or, as I did, wake before dawn and be down in the plains from dawn to mid-afternoon – before indulging in a swim, massage and cocktail as the red ball of sun disappeared behind the spectacular apricot-dappled savannah grasslands below.

Condé Nast Traveller – November 2024