Amboseli National Park, formerly Maasai Amboseli Game Reserve, is a national park in Kajiado South Constituency in Kajiado County, Kenya. The park is 39,206 ha (392.06 km2) in size at the core of an 8,000 km2 (3,100 sq mi) ecosystem that spreads across the Kenya-Tanzania border. The local people are mainly Maasai, but people from other parts of the country have settled there attracted by the successful tourist-driven economy and intensive agriculture along the system of swamps that makes this low-rainfall area, average 350 mm (14 in), one of the best wildlife-viewing experiences in the world with 400 species of birds including water birds like pelicans, kingfishers, crakes, hamerkop and 47 raptor species.
The park protects two of the five main swamps, and includes a dried-up Pleistocene lake and semiarid vegetation.
The park is famous for being the best place in the world to get close to free elephants. Other attractions at the park include opportunities to meet the Maasai and visit a Maasai village. The park also offers views of Mount Kilimanjaro, the highest free-standing mountain in the world.
Amboseli has been home to Echo, the world’s most searched elephant, and the subject of numerous books and documentaries, followed over the course of nearly four decades by Dr. Eko passed away in 2009 when she was about 60 years old.
The park was also a safe haven for an incredible bull elephant named Tim. This mighty leviathan quickly became a major attraction with its size and its famous tusks that reached the earth and was estimated to have been around 50 years old at the time of his death of natural causes on February 5, 2020.
Amboseli National Park offers some of the best opportunities for viewing African wildlife because the vegetation is sparse due to the long, dry months. The protected area is home to the African bush elephant, Cape buffalo, impala, lion, leopard, spotted hyena, Maasai giraffe, Grant’s zebra, and blue wildebeest. A range of large and small birds also occur.
In the park there are several rules for protecting wildlife: never leave the car, except in designated places; Do not harass animals in any way; Always keep tracks; Off-road driving is prohibited and animals are always given right-of-way. The roads in Amboseli are characterized by a loose surface of volcanic soil that is dusty in the dry season and impassable in the rainy season.