Your First Game Drive

Leave Arusha after a buffet breakfast for Lake Manyara National Park. Situated in Tanzania’s central-northern region with the Lake Manyara to its east and the Manyara Escarpment to its west, the Lake Manyara National Park offers breathtaking views and a large variety of habitats supporting an array of wildlife. This small park is home to surprising biodiversity and features a magnificent landscape of acacia woodlands, forests, baobab strewn cliffs, algae-streaked hot springs, swamps and the lake itself.

The park supports over 400 species of bird and the largest concentration of baboons anywhere in the world. Other species to spot include giraffes, zebras, wildebeest, impala, waterbuck, warthog, the Cape clawless otter, and the Egyptian mongoose. Don’t miss the opportunity to see thousands of flamingos on the lake, the renowned tree-climbing lions, and large families of elephants strolling through the forest.

Here, you’ll take a short game drive through its lush groundwater forest where you might even see its famous tree-climbing lions. In the early evening you’ll arrive at Kirurumu Manyara Lodge. Perched on the edge of the Great Rift Valley with commanding, panoramic views of Lake Manyara, you’ll be treated to a gourmet dinner. After a nightcap, retire and fall asleep to the comforting sounds of the African night.

Accommodation

Kirurumu Manyara Lodge

Kirurumu Manyara Lodge is set high on the edge of the Great Rift Valley, enjoying a marvellous, uplifting and panoramic view eastward over Lake Manyara, the Rift floor and Mt. Losimingori. Accommodation is provided in 27 spacious, luxurious tented cottages, 2 Honeymoon suites and 2 family cottages.

All accommodations include a personal verandah that overlooks the Rift valley escarpment over Lake Manyara. Facilities and services available to guests include full breakfasts, free Wi-Fi, and daily housekeeping. Area activities include botanical walks, mountain biking, treks, hikes, game viewing and hot air balloon safaris.

Board basis: Bed, Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner

Discover the Serengeti

Leave camp after breakfast for the drive to the Serengeti National Park, passing through rich farmland until reaching the lush montane forests of the Ngorongoro Conservation Area Crater Highlands.

After ascending and descending the rift escarpment, stop first at Olduvai Gorge, one of the world’s most famous fossil and archaeological sites, dating back two million years and where many finds of early humans were discovered.

Tour the Olduvai Museum before a picnic lunch. In the afternoon, continue game-viewing in the Serengeti. Undoubtedly the best-known wildlife sanctuary in the world, the Serengeti is home to the highest density of animals in the world as well as being unrivalled for its natural beauty, diversity and scientific value.

During your daily game-drives you’ll witness the annual ancient drama of life, death and rebirth in this primeval wilderness. The Serengeti, together with Kenya’s Masai Mara Game Park, constitute Africa’s most famous wildlife park, spread over the enthralling landscapes of northern Tanzania. This is a precious ecosystem, supporting the annual wildebeest migration through the Serengeti and the Masai Mara.

The largest mass movement of land mammals on the planet involves more than a million animals following the rains, including more than 1.5 million white-bearded wildebeest and 250 000 zebras. Prides of lions, as well as groups of elephants, giraffes, gazelles, and eland, roam among the photogenic vast grass plains between weird-and-wonderful-looking acacia trees.

Accommodation

Kirurumu Serengeti Central Camp

Kirurumu Serengeti Camp is a luxury mobile camp, moved seasonally to take best advantage of the vast Serengeti. The camp is used as a base, a spring board for an early morning game drive, a break for a sumptuous lunch, a respite from the heat of the day and the finale to a day’s adventure where stories can be swapped around a fire. As a small and intimate camp the staff are on hand to look after a very limited number of guests and so the level of attention and service is always excellent.

The Camp moves according to season! Short grass plains in December to March and then it moves north in June to the Western Corridor and then more central in the later dry season months to take advantage of the resident game around the Seronera area.

Board basis: Bed, Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner

Ngorongoro Crater Adventure

Drive to the spectacular Ngorongoro Crater, a collapsed volcano, once as high as present day Mount Meru, for an afternoon of exciting game-viewing and a picnic lunch.

Descend 2,000 feet to the floor of this 10 mile-wide ‘caldera’ that teems with a variety of wildlife, including the highest density of lions per square kilometre in Africa, open savannah grasslands, the Lerai groundwater forest and a soda lake tinged pink by thousands of flamingos.

Drive back up to the Crater rim in late afternoon for dinner and overnight at the Ngorongoro Serena Lodge.

Accommodation

Ngorongoro Serena Lodge

Perched on the jagged rim of the crater, wreathed in morning mist, camouflaged in river-stone and cloaked in indigenous creepers, the Ngorongoro Serena Safari Lodge is a triumph of ecological and architectural fusion.

Sensitively constructed so as to take nothing from its environment whilst affording endless vistas over the heat-shimmering reaches of the crater below, the clustered boulder-built buildings of the Lodge hug the crater rim, linked by rope-lashed timber walkways that skirt the buttressed roots of ancient, liana-hung trees.

Board basis: Bed, Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner

Journey to Coffee Country

After an early breakfast, spend another half-day in the Crater photographing or simply enjoying the animals and landscapes. At lunchtime, relax with a picnic, then leave on a 2-hour drive to the historic and newly renovated Plantation Lodge, in heart of coffee country. Arrive in time for a cool drink and hot shower before a delicious dinner and restful night.

Accommodation

The Plantation Lodge

The Plantation Lodge’s location offers maximum safari enjoyment to visitors. It is situated close to the entrance of the Ngorongoro Conservation Area and the Lake Manyara National Park, and just a short journey away from the Tarangire National Park and the Serengeti. The lodge features individually furnished rooms and suites, as well as all amenities for a comfortably relaxed vacation. Guest accommodations range from luxurious suites to stylish standard rooms and a spacious garden house.

Board basis: Bed, Breakfast and Dinner

Departure Day

After breakfast, return to Arusha, stopping for lunch at a popular local restaurant. Later enjoy the benefits of day accommodations at the Kilimanjaro Airport Hotel before a late transfer to the airport for your return flight home.

We hope you have had an incredible time with us in Tanzania, and leave feeling as though you have packed as many authentic experiences as possible into your time here.