SAMSIG Maasai Mara 2026 —
A Congress to Remember

15–20 May 2026 · Sarova Mara Game Camp

Maasai Mara National Reserve, Kenya

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The 2026 SAMSIG Safari Congress has come and gone — and it has left a mark that will be difficult to follow. Eighty-five delegates, partners, and faculty gathered at Sarova Mara Game Camp in the heart of the Maasai Mara National Reserve for five days of world-class musculoskeletal imaging, extraordinary wildlife encounters, and the kind of human connection that only a small, exclusive congress in a remarkable setting can produce. To every delegate and faculty member who made the journey — some of you from the other side of the world — thank you. This congress exists because of you.

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The academic programme, curated by Vice Chairman Iqbal Ganie, was widely regarded as the strongest in SAMSIG’s history. Lectures spanning advanced MRI techniques, nerve imaging, bone marrow pathology, sacroiliac joint assessment, and musculoskeletal tuberculosis were delivered by an international faculty whose combined depth of experience was genuinely rare to find under one roof. Ethics and CPD points were covered in full. The standard of scientific discussion — formal and informal — was a reminder of what a focused, specialist congress can achieve when the right people are in the same place at the same time.

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Outside the lecture tent, the Mara delivered in every way that matters. The Big Five were all sighted — including a rare black rhino encounter and a spectacular leopard in a fig tree that held the game drive vehicles spellbound for the better part of an hour. Lion prides, elephant families, enormous buffalo herds, and the full cast of East African plains game — Thomson’s gazelles, topi, Kirk’s dik-dik, kongoni — kept every game drive memorable from first light to sundown. The pre-dawn hot air balloon flight over the savanna, ending with a bush breakfast in the open grassland, was for many the single most unforgettable experience of the week. The guided bush walk brought delegates face to face with the Mara at ground level — a perspective that no vehicle can replicate. And the Maasai evening, with delegates and faculty wrapped in their shukas around the boma fire, was the kind of moment that doesn’t need a photograph to be remembered.

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Behind everything, as always, was Lizette Worst of All Over Africa — the quiet force who made five days of complex logistics feel entirely effortless to the people enjoying them. Our ground partner in Kenya, Steve Biko, ensured that everything from transfers to the conference tent ran without a hitch from the moment the first delegate landed in Nairobi. And to our sponsors — Blok (Gold), Old Mutual, Investec, Philips, Samsung, Guerbet, and pHformula — your generosity made the experience richer for everyone in the room. Thank you.

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SAMSIG Maasai Mara 2026 is now part of the society’s history. The committee is already looking ahead. Watch this space.

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— Shaun Scheepers, Chairman, SAMSIG