diff --git a/keycloak/connection.py b/keycloak/connection.py
index 3bc55f7..da45d23 100644
--- a/keycloak/connection.py
+++ b/keycloak/connection.py
@@ -49,6 +49,8 @@ class ConnectionManager(object):
         self._s = requests.Session()
         self._s.auth = lambda x: x  # don't let requests add auth headers
 
+        self._s.get(self.base_url)
+
         # # retry once to reset connection with Keycloak after  tomcat's ConnectionTimeout
         # # see https://github.com/marcospereirampj/python-keycloak/issues/36
         # for protocol in ('https://', 'http://'):