- Where the farm feeds the table, the park feeds the soul, and the entire enterprise - family, land, animals, and guests
- is held together by love.
In 2008, the Chapman family made the kind of decision that most people only dream of. They uprooted their lives in Australia, flew to Kenya, and purchased an old Kenyan homestead on 20 acres of land on the beautiful banks of the Mbagathi River the same river that forms the southern boundary of Nairobi National Park. They had a dream: to create one of Kenya's most beautiful and sustainable safari lodges, rooted in organic farming, genuine conservation, and the kind of warm, family-centred hospitality that money cannot manufacture. Five years of work, love, and the particular stubbornness of people who believe completely in what they are building later, Ololo Safari Lodge opened its doors in 2013. The name "Ololo" comes from the Maasai language and means "Place of Movement" an apt description for a property that draws its energy from the constant, vital movement of wildlife across its park boundary, the daily rhythms of the working farm, and the generous coming and going of guests who arrive as strangers and leave as something very much like friends. The lodge sits 45 minutes from both Nairobi's international and domestic airports, yet its seclusion and beauty make it feel entirely removed from the city's pace. Ololo Safari Lodge is owned and operated by The Chapman family Australian by origin, wholly Kenyan by commitment. They live on the property, farm the land, manage the lodge, and host their guests with a personal engagement that defines the Ololo experience. Joanna Chapman designs much of the lodge's furniture, built on-site by three local craftsmen known as Fundis. The farm team manages dairy cows, laying chickens, mushroom crops, and the lodge's extensive vegetable gardens. The Ololo Foundation, launched in 2023, formalizes the family's community impact work funding high school scholarships, tree planting, sport programmes, and essential support for St. John's School in Kibera. Staying at Ololo is, quite genuinely, an act of community investment. Ololo Safari Lodge offers 16 rooms across a wonderfully varied range of accommodation types each one different, each one carefully designed, and each one reflecting a different relationship with the land and wildlife around it.
TERRACE SUITE
The lodge's most spectacular room - private living area with traditional fireplace, marble bathroom with classic roll-top bath, and an extraordinary park terrace outlook.
TOWER ROOM
Positioned within the property's distinctive stone tower - a characterful, modern-furnished space with its own private balcony and panoramic views across the park and Ngong Hills.
SEVEN STABLE ROOMS
The original stone-walled stables of the homestead, individually designed and converted into seven charming, queen-bedded rooms with their own personality and parkland character.
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THREE TENTED COTTAGES
Canvas and Makuti thatch construction - an authentic East African safari feel with proper luxuries: large beds, spa baths, and the night sounds of the park just beyond the canvas.
FAMILY WING
One double bedroom and one triple bedroom, both en suite - ideal for families of up to five. Shared veranda with park views.
STABLE COTTAGE
A three-bedroom private cottage with fully equipped kitchenette, two bathrooms, a beautiful terrace, and space for six - perfect for families or small groups wanting complete privacy. All rooms feature room service, Wi-Fi, spa services (on request), and large baths with natural bath products sourced from the lodge's own organic programme.
20-Acre Working Organic Farm
Morning & Evening Game Drives (Nairobi NP)
Swimming Pool
The Kitchen at Ololo Restaurant
Library & Wine Cellar
Fireplace Lounge
Fire -Pit Garden
Farm Tours (Guided)
Egg Collection & Cow Milking
Sheldrick Trust - 20-Min Park Drive
Cultural Excursions (Karen / City)
Furniture Workshop Visits
Spa Treatments (In -Room)
Complimentary Laundry
Airport Transfers
Ololo Foundation Community Projects
- Trip
Advisor Travelers' Choice
- Consistently rated among Kenya's finest eco -tourism & sustainable safari properties
- Widely recognised for outstanding farm -to-table culinary programme
- Ololo Foundation 2023 Community Impact Award
The Kitchen at Ololo is one of Kenya's most genuinely extraordinary dining experiences, and its secret is embarrassingly simple: almost everything on the plate was grown or raised on the property itself. The kitchen team creates daily menus around what the farm has that morning eggs from the Ololo chickens, milk from Joyce the dairy cow, vegetables from the kitchen garden, mushrooms from the mushroom house and then builds dishes of real beauty and flavour around that foundation. No hotel in Nairobi's safari orbit can match this level of paddock-to-plate provenance. The restaurant overlooks the national park tables on the open terrace allow guests to eat under African skies with the movement of wildlife visible on the plains below. Bread, cakes, and pastries are baked fresh in-house daily. The lodge's wine cellar holds a well-curated selection, and the fire-pit garden provides the most atmospheric sundowner setting in Nairobi. Farm tours can be arranged at any time of day, including an invitation to collect breakfast eggs and milk the cow one of those experiences that sounds eccentric and turns out to be completely, memorably wonderful. Ololo is the last property on this list because it deserves to be remembered last the one you are still thinking about weeks after you have returned home. No property we work with in Nairobi combines the full safari experience, the working farm, the family warmth, and the community purpose with quite the effortless coherence of Ololo. The Terrace Suite is non-negotiable if available. The farm tour is not optional it is part of the experience. And if you have children with you, hands in the vegetable garden at dawn and a walk to meet Joyce the cow are the kind of childhood experiences that survive the passage of time and become the stories told at dinner tables for decades. For guests who want to understand what sustainable, soulful luxury travel in East Africa can truly mean this is the answer. Ololo does not perform sustainability. It lives it. The Chapman family's decision to leave Australia, buy a Kenyan homestead, and build something that feeds its guests from its own land, protects the national park on its boundary, and funds schools in Kibera is not a marketing strategy it is a life choice. The lodge they have created is the physical expression of that choice: beautiful, purposeful, and full of the kind of joy that only genuinely committed people can build into a place. We are proud to include it in our portfolio and prouder still every time a guest returns from Ololo saying exactly what guests always say: "I didn't want to leave. Ololo Safari Lodge is, without reservation, Vard Africa's highest recommendation for families travelling with children of any age. The farm with its animals, its vegetable gardens, its daily rhythms of collection and cultivation is a living classroom that engages children with complete, effortless enchantment. The Family Wing and Stable Cottage provide excellent family accommodation configurations. Morning game drives in Nairobi National Park are the most accessible wildlife safari experience available for children in Africa. The 20-minute park drive to the Sheldrick Wildlife Trust, where baby elephants are fed and tucked up for the evening, is among the most transformative experiences available to young travellers anywhere on earth. Ololo actively welcomes, designs for, and genuinely loves families and it shows in every detail of the experience.
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