Great Migration River Crossings

Nothing in nature prepares you for a Mara River crossing. The wildebeest have been moving for months — up from the southern Serengeti calving grounds, through the central plains, north toward the Mara. When the front reaches the river, something shifts. The herd masses on the bank. Minutes pass. Sometimes hours. Then one animal steps into the water, and the rest follow in a roaring, churning torrent that can last for two hours and involve tens of thousands of animals in a single crossing.

The crocodiles are waiting. The lions and leopards patrol the far bank. Not every wildebeest makes it. The crossing is life and death at a scale that simply does not exist anywhere else on Earth — and the fortunate thing, from a visitor's perspective, is that there are dozens of crossings through the season, each unpredictable, each unrepeatable.

The window runs from July to October, with August and September typically producing the most dramatic crossings. Mboka positions guests at private mobile camps on the Mara River — limited to 8–12 guests, repositioned each season to maximise proximity to the crossings. These camps book out entirely each year, often by January.