Angama Mara, Kenya: Lions and leopards and elephants, oh my! Skip Disneyland. Take your kids on safari

Let’s drag the kids halfway around the world! To Africa! If you’ve never had this thought, that would make you a perfectly sane parent. But even though a safari sounds daunting, the annual migration made by millions of hungry zebra, wildebeest, antelope, and other animals in East Africa does play out conveniently during school holidays ( from July to about October). All of Africa’s Big Five— lion, leopard, elephant, buffalo, black rhino— are sighted regularly in the Mara Triangle, the northwestern part of the Maasai Mara National Reserve. In addition, the Mara River is home to hippos and some of the continent’s largest crocodiles; you’ll also see jackals and cheetahs, and the kids will be able to tell friends they spied a creature called the bat- eared fox.

Deflating a hot-air balloon in Angama Mara; a Maasai performer (below)