Condé Nast Traveller - The View From Here
September 2016

There are few lodges in Africa more embedded in the community and landscape than Tassia, located as high as eagles fly on Kenya’s Lekurruki Ranch, on conservation land owned and managed by the Mukogodo Maasai. To stay here is to be absorbed into the wilderness — six rooms and 60,000 acres — caressed by the hot thermals that rise from the plains to this isolated eyrie of extraordinary, open-sided structures built of mud and timber and thatch. There are plenty of elephants and even regular sightings of rare African wild dogs, but game viewing is not the only reason to come here. Martin Wheeler, the fourth-generation Kenyan who manages the lodge with his partner Anikia, organises tandem paragliding flights and walks along the seasonal river beds. There are also hikes up distant Blood Mountain, a historical site of clashes between the Maasai and hunter-gatherer tribes. And for those seeking real solitude, Martin’s father Charlie Wheeler offers multi-day walking safaris with camels.