That was exciting… our final photo safari of 2025 proved to be quite the carnival of thrilling night photography and spectacular daylight air shows, thrown in to keep the adrenaline pumping. We couldn’t have wished for a more high-octane finish to our programme for this year, delivering some very different photo opportunities throughout; with barely a break for breath.

Swapping sleep for the secret world of Africa after dark was no hardship when top calibre wildlife sightings just kept coming. We were rubbing our eyes, not because they were tired, but in disbelief at the abundant chances for high-impact shots across a variety of always awesome, occasionally rare and often ‘wish-list’ subjects.

And what we lost in sleep we gained in height, because when we weren’t in night hides – or catching up on some zzzzz’s back at the two lodges where we had exclusive use – we were soaring above the birds to shoot flotillas of flamingoes on or flying across the ever-changing vistas of two of Kenya’s famous soda lakes – Magadi and Natron – complete with dizzying colours and mesmerising patterns. It was pretty non-stop… but in a good way.

Like all the best adventures it began with a boat ride. A boat ride over a shallow, tea-coloured river in the tranquil south of Kenya’s Great Rift Valley. Having arrived at Shompole Wilderness just a few hours earlier our photographers were about to embark on their first night hide sessions of the trip. The fastest route to those hides saw us crossing the picturesque river below our lodge in a tiny metal boat.

The afternoon heat was searing. But the sense of trepidation was even more palpable. We crossed with our camera bags between our knees and our knees tucked under our chins while a group of athletic young Masai in their traditional red shukas tugged the rope pulleys and the little craft, to ferry us safely to the vehicles waiting for us above the sandy bank opposite. What lay ahead?

A busy schedule for one thing. We would be experiencing five night sessions in four different night hides across the next few days. The plan was that each hide, located in different parts of this untouristed, unspoilt region, would reveal a different range of photogenic nocturnal wildlife for us to capture. We were opening our account with two hides – the Shompole plains hide (growing massively in reputation) and the reserve’s newly opened Kichaka hide (Kichaka means bush). A group of three photographers, with one of us guiding each group, would be deposited for the coming night in each. The hides have beds, toilets, WiFi and we’d be taking our meals, snacks and drinks along to keep body and soul together. We would compare notes and stories the next day over brunch back at the lodge.

As our vehicles approached our night’s ‘accommodation’ the dusty plains appeared desolate, devoid of life. Nothing stirred. ‘What’, everyone must have been thinking, as the heat beat down and the signature dust of a peak African dry season coated everything, including the teeth, ‘have I let myself in for?’ We were soon to find out. The enveloping heat at this late stage of the dry season is what underpins the success of all four of these increasingly popular and active nocturnal hides. When the place is at its driest, like now, these hides teem with water-dependent wildlife – especially after dark.

The ubiquitous dust we’ve been battling since arriving is not a bane but a boon. It’s the secret sauce; providing an extra smoky magic in shots when you switch from either front or side-lighting to the backlights to ramp up the drama. That’s when your subjects appear mysteriously in the frame as if swirled in dry ice. The Kichaka hide was only a few weeks old when we visited, and backlighting hadn’t yet been installed, but is promised for our next visit.

You arrive at the Shompole hides in mid to late afternoon so your first photography there is in daylight. It gives you time to settle in and enjoy the parade of animals that pitch up seemingly out of nowhere. But it’s from dusk to dawn these hides truly bring their magic.

Our team could have clicked non-stop in the plains hide. It’s always performed well on our visits. From the opening act – when huge bull elephants came right in close and stayed to accompany our passage from twilight, through the blue hour to night-time proper – we were off to a wizard start. They sprayed water enthusiastically from their trunks, tussled in playful displays of mighty power and posed magisterially in front of backlights we could control in terms of timing, direction and intensity. Our photographers quickly nailed the settings and were soon hungrily capturing cracking images of these and other iconic game in the blackness, including leopard, lion, giraffe, hyena, buffalo and impala. Hardly time to draw breath.

A marvellous array of smaller, less well-known, normally tricky-to-see nocturnal species stopped by to fill in between the big stuff. We had dramatic shots of civet, bat-eared fox, black-backed jackal and both Egyptian and white tailed mongoose, to name but a few, drinking with perfect reflections. Both groups’ sessions in this hide were pretty constant with activity. No sooner did a person decide it might be safe to take a nap than one of us, or our Masai guide, had to tug them awake to come get shots of yet another different visitor joining us for drinks.

The highlights?  Hard to choose, but  – aside from impressive backlit giraffes and elephants – it probably had to be the apex predators – made magnificent by the blackness. One group was treated to a stunning young male leopard who came twice to have his picture taken. He was chased off by the ellies the first time so the group were happily surprised to be given a second chance later in the evening when he drank in the perfect spot for a considerable amount of time.

The other group ended up holding their breath in awe when the lions suddenly pitched up (a female and several sub-adult cubs – the same ones we saw at the hide last year – now grown into leggy teenagers with bright eyes and rapt curiosity for all they encountered). The dust their patrolling at the water’s edge kicked up gifted us some eerily atmospheric shots of these A-listers. Additionally a special moment for ourselves was seeing a bush pig emerge from the darkness to drink. Quite a big thing as we’ve only ever seen them once before in all our years of coming to Africa. It was their first ever appearance at the hide.

We weren’t expecting the Kichaka hide to deliver quite such hectic shooting as we’d been advised animals in the vicinity were still getting used to it.  We needn’t have worried. An impressive variety of critters put in neat cameo performances across both nights, including waterbuck, impala herds, warthog families, varied mongoose species, a delightful pair of Verreaux eagle owls and crowning glory for one group – a headlining caracal, It nervously approached extremely close, but while most people were sleeping. Thankfully it drank long enough for us to get everyone up and quickly in place for some wonderful shots of this not-often-photographed slinky small cat lapping the water gratefully. Yet another breath-holding moment.

By this point, just like our subjects, we were more active by night than by day. Yet no-one was flagging. With such wonderful opening sessions our gang was raring to sample yet more of the local nightlife. We transferred to our next exclusive-use lodge a short drive away to sample two more night hides. Yes, it was again a packed schedule, but the spacious suites with beckoning plunge pools and the fact this place provided our own personal hilltop helipad base for doing  exciting doors-off heli flips over the soda lakes certainly made us feel like VIPs (very important photographers).

We’ll start with the hide at Lentorre Lodge. It’s bang on site so extremely accessible. It’s even possible, despite the fact there are beds in the hide, to return to your suite to sleep at any point in the night,  if you choose. It’s an intimate drinking pool and perfect for neat shots of the smaller night-time characters and also backlighting them. That said bigger fish including lions, leopards and even big bull elephants do stop by. We just missed a striped hyena chase a leopard up the tree overhanging the water by the skin of our teeth. But that’s another story. Our top photographic catch at this hide was another fabulous caracal encounter – this time backlit and, for one brief moment when it pivoted to check out something that caught its attention, cloaked in a halo of dust. It was an awesome sighting made even more special for the fact the group were still buzzing about the caracal shots they’d bagged just the night before. (We were lucky enough to photograph a caracal at Lentorre last year too.) We also had good opportunities at this hide with genet, more mongoose, dik-dik (another first for us), scrub hares, impala, striped hyena (distant, not drinking) and waterbuck. Not the full-on rush hour of the plains hide, but it’s quality that counts.

Just time for a quick forty winks before pushing on to our next night hide at Ndoto House. This hide, located below the Ndoto lodge about an hour’s drive across the plain, had only just opened when we visited Lentorre last year and was not available to use, so this was going to be a first for us all.

Before the evening’s photography we enjoyed dinner up top at this stunningly-located luxury destination with its jaw-dropping views across the plain below. Tempting as it might have been to linger we finished up, descended the escarpment and entered the hide just as twilight fell. We didn’t have to wait long for our first subjects in the dark. Some zebras came, then some more and yet more still. It seemed that throughout the night zebras flowed in front of us in wave after wave of stripes.

In our opinion zebras rank as one of the best subjects to photograph under darkness, given their monochromatic stripes, so this was a night-time photography-fest. You rarely see them drinking at night in other hides and if they do it’s not in such numbers. Front-lit in serried rows with reflections, backlit in singles or dancing herds, shot with slow-shutter speeds, with ICM, experimenting with multiple exposures; we celebrated the zebra fiesta in as many ways as we could. Admittedly the zebras were the stars, but other subjects did squeeze in from time to time including a crazy drinking Kori bustard,  the world’s heaviest flying bird, in the blue hour, and for one group a beautiful serval cat stole in late one night to puncture the permanent bar-code effect we were being treated too.

It’s tough to keep your feet on the ground when there’s so much photographic inspiration, but its literally impossible when the blades of a helicopter are whirring, lifting you over the escarpment and whisking you off to photograph thousands of flamingoes over the soda lakes. Our guests were thrilled by the wild ride in the air and the many images they landed during their two hour-long flips . We agreed with our pilot that the colours were even better this year and it was a delight for us to see the grinning faces of returning photographers after each spellbinding flight.

Our shooters also loved ‘nights-off’ being nocturnal, on one occasion spending the late afternoon visiting a tiny Masai village; meeting and photographing the traditional nomadic pastoralist community who share the conservancy in harmony with the wildlife. Returning at dusk to dinner at the lodge our guests savoured refreshing beers and G&Ts toasting the diverse experiences, photographic captures and connections they’d had throughout in this beguiling wilderness.

It was a pull to leave. But our photography wasn’t finished yet. A few days in Amboseli with traditional game drives and some classic elephant photography (we had a fabulous close encounter with the reserve’s second biggest tusker on our very last afternoon, to crown the trip) proved the perfect wind-down before travelling home to catch up on all the photo-editing…And sleep!

Drumrolls and massive thank yous must go to the wonderful group of people who made the trip so enjoyable and rewarding. Thank you to Johan, Ollie, Nixon and Jono and all the team at Shompole  for another fabulous and successful stay in your secret hideaway. Thank you also to Leonard, Stephen, Joel, not forgetting Rose, and the whole team at Lentorre Lodge (and Ndoto) for going the extra mile at all times to make us feel your special place on the hill was our home. You are all amazing! And thanks to all the spotters especially Joseph, who we hope is now fully recovered.

But we mustn’t forget our wonderful shooters. Hugs all round to our intrepid team. Thanks once again to AW ‘I’m thinking high-key for this one’ and JW ‘I’m already doing it’. We hope your campaign for a wine fridge in all wildlife hides is a success. Thanks to KS for beating us all to Facebook each day with your stunners, and to CD who was last seen in his plunge pool. We plan to courier a big tusker to your home so we can finally get some peace. And of course to AA and CJB for rocking the most wardrobe changes of the year. Hope you’ve all now caught up on your beauty sleep!