Kenya: Buying railway tickets without M-pesa

[Sandrine1982]

Hi.

Trying my luck here as I've been trying to book tickets for the Madaraka express from Nairobi to Voi, and from Voi to Mombasa. It looks like the official website only accepts M-Pesa payments with a Kenyan SIM card.

Is there a way around this? Has anyone managed to book tickets for this train on another website, or used a Kenyan travel agent? If so, which one, and what was the commission? I'm a bit wary of random websites offering to buy tickets so looking for something trustworthy ...

Thanks in advance.

It’s worth asking one of the places you’re staying at to try and buy them for you. If you’re staying at a small independent place, they’re usually very happy to help with anything like that and they put it on your bill.

https://www.seat61.com/index-mobile.htm

this website is good for buying international rail tickets and can usually tell you the best place to do it. Third party apps like Trip can often place orders for you.

Thanks, I've used the Seat61 website in the past - it's brilliant.

Thank you both for your advice.