Who We Are & How We Came To Be

The spark for the concept which grew into Bush Adventures came to Silas and Laura when talking about new ways for travellers to experience otherwise distant cultures. Why not organise a holiday where visitors learn how to be Maasai warriors?

The concept really took shape as the pair saw in the idea a way to match Silas’ long experience with tourists to a business which would allow them to increase efforts to preserve Kenya’s cultural heritage.

SILAS KOIYAREN has worked for many years in a high-end lodge, guiding tourists in one of Kenya’s most successfully protected wildlife areas in the Lewa Conservancy, close to the area of Northern Maasailand where he was born and grew up.

Silas sees Bush Adventures as a way to develop innovative ideas, and to bring fresh momentum to tourism in Kenya by focusing on the growing market for outgoing travellers who seek new, authentic and challenging experiences.

“It seems simple to me,” he says, “our idea of bringing small groups of visitors to live as my people live creates a win-win. Visitors experience something they would never be able to access, and our traditions hold a value that allow them to be protected.”

LAURA ALESSANDRINI moved to Kenya in 2006 to work as a financial director for a conservation organisation based in DRC and Kenya, leaving behind a traditional corporate lifestyle with the Boston Consulting Group in Italy, during which she also gained her MBA at INSEAD.

At the end of 2007, Laura joined a family owned group of companies focused on high-end tourism. After two years there, she established Bush Adventures in late 2009.

“It is a concept which fits well with my personal values,” she says. “I want to contribute to preserving traditional lifestyles and I believe this will be most effectively done by finding for them a central role in strong, sustainable businesses.”