Things to Do in Nyeri, Kenya

Quick facts: Covering more than 760 square kilometers, the area hides bamboo forests, misty swamps, and waterfalls that supply water to the entire region. It is home to black rhinos, the rare bongo antelope, and the giant forest hog, animals you will not easily encounter in the wilds of Africa.

Highlights: Below the illuminated salt lick, where elephants and black rhinos gather at dusk, stands a wooden house wedged between tree branches. Princess Elizabeth spent a royal night here in February 1952, and the observation window above the water still offers you the same view of the wildlife.

Quick facts: On the equator, Africa's second highest mountain rises to a height of 5,199 meters and was once covered by glaciers more than three kilometers thick. The rain on its slopes sends water into the light, giving rise to the Ewaso Ng'iro and Tana rivers, which sustain the savannas and millions of people in the region.

Highlights: The glaciers on the equatorial peak are among the last of their kind in the world, and scientists have been measuring their retreat since 1893, with most of them expected to disappear by 2030. The unusually varied vegetation, from rainforest to tree-like groundsels and giant lobelias, makes the ascent a journey across climatic zones that you will not find anywhere else on the globe.

Quick facts: A wooden hut on stilts rises above the salt lick, where elephants, buffalo, and rhinos drift in at dusk. When Queen Elizabeth II learned here in 1952 that she had become monarch, she went up as a princess and came down as a queen.

Highlights: Room 57 still bears the name of Queen Elizabeth, who spent the night here that changed her life forever. From the observation terrace upstairs you see the animals within arm's reach while you dine, and at night guards escort guests to the hut with torches.

Quick facts: The scout founder Robert Baden-Powell chose his final resting place here, and on the slope of Mount Kenya, near the hotel, his simple grave with a view of the peak remains to this day. The story of the famous Treetops lookout hut, where Princess Elizabeth learned she had become queen, unfolded from the garden of the original club.

Highlights: In a glass display case you will see the personal suitcase, the scout hat, and the handwritten letters of Robert Baden-Powell, which have been preserved here unchanged. Every afternoon the hotel still serves tea on the veranda exactly as the founder of scouting enjoyed it daily until January 1941.

Quick facts: The founder of world scouting spent the last four years of his life right here, surrounded by books, medals, and letters from scouts on literally every continent. At the nearby cemetery of Saint Peter he rests beneath a headstone turned toward the peak of Mount Kenya, where pilgrims still place hundreds of scout scarves today.

Highlights: In his bedroom, the original bed still stands, and on the writing desk lies his final message to the scouts of the world, dictated only a few weeks before his death. The entire movement still reads that same letter at campfires today, from Kenya to Scandinavia.

Quick facts: The founder of the scouting movement loved this highland so much that he moved here and wished to remain forever. Scouts therefore place no flowers on the grave, only small twigs, and the headstone is adorned with a lily bearing the inscription 'Chief Scout of the World'.

Highlights: You will recognize the uniqueness of the place from the fact that the grave points directly at the snow-capped peak, which was the founder's burial wish. Scouts from dozens of countries arrive here in uniform, lower their flags, and quietly place twigs, creating a moving ceremonial moment under the open sky.

Quick facts: The two and a half meter tall bronze figure holds a rifle with the barrel pointing down and a sword as a symbol of peace after a bloody struggle. Fifty years after the execution, the site stood empty for a long time, and officials confirmed the location of his remains only in 2019.

Highlights: Near the pedestal is the spot where British forces captured him, badly wounded, in the autumn of 1956, and the figure is looking in exactly the direction in which he was then dragged away. Every year on February 18, the day of his execution, hundreds of people in brown leather head coverings gather at the bronze and pay him a quiet tribute.

Quick facts: More than ninety war graves from both world wars line the paths in a perfectly maintained grounds managed by the CWGC. Beneath a stone bearing the scout symbol of a circle with a dot lies Lord Baden-Powell, the founder of scouting, who spent the last three years of his life here.

Highlights: Scouts from around the world still make their way to Baden-Powell's grave and place seashells, the ancient sign of the promise scouts make. From his stone, a view opens onto the snow-capped peak above the equatorial plain, while the surrounding trees cast a cooling shade over the rows of graves.

Quick facts: The impact of the water thunders into a narrow gorge from a height of about nine meters, spraying mist onto the surrounding ferns. The river flows down from the mountain forest here all year round, so the waterfall does not dry up even in the driest months.

Highlights: Below the edge of the rock, the water swirls into a dark pool, into which only the boldest dare to jump on scorching days. Black-and-white colobus monkeys leap from branch to branch directly above the visitors' heads, while the droplets in the sunlight turn the stream into a rainbow.