Kenya's Treetops hotel reopens after Covid shutdown

NAIROBI, Kenya — Kenya's renowned Treetops hotel, where Britain's then Princess Elizabeth was staying when she became queen, has reopened its doors after closing down during the Covid pandemic.

First opened in 1932 as an overnight stay for wealthy and intrepid visitors, Treetops Lodge overlooks a watering hole in the Aberdares National Park, about a three-hour drive from the Kenyan capital Nairobi.

It shut down in 2021 during the Covid-19 pandemic that devastated tourism in Kenya and across the world.

Elizabeth, then 25, was staying at Treetops in February 1952 with her husband Prince Philip on a visit to the then British colony, the first stop of a tour of the Commonwealth, when her father King George VI died of lung cancer.

Two years after the historic visit to Kenya, with Elizabeth having assumed the throne, Treetops burned down in what was rumoured to be an arson attack by anti-colonial Mau Mau rebels.

A new, much larger hotel was built on elevated wooden stilts on the opposite side of the watering hole to the original setting, where it still stands today.

"We are celebrating (the) revival of an icon in the tourism circuit," Kenya Tourism Board chairman Francis Gichamba said at the weekend opening ceremony at Treetops.

He said that for the first time since 2019, Kenya had welcomed more than two million visitors -- without giving a time frame -- and was aiming for three million by the end of the year.

The reopening was attended by Kenyan Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua and other dignitaries, including British High Commissioner Neil Wigan.

"We value the history linked to the Treetops Lodge. It has a unique ecosystem. The reopening will bring more prosperity to the local community and more tourists," Wigan said.

King Charles III, who became monarch after the death of Queen Elizabeth in September 2022, visited Kenya in October-November last year.