Safari in East Africa and the Serengeti 2027

If you are arriving on Day 1, you will be collected from the airport and transferred to your lodge in the lush forests around the town of Arusha. Arusha is the safari capital of Tanzania located at the foot of Mt. Meru, close to Mount Kilimanjaro, the Manyara, Tarangire and Ngorongoro National Parks. Built by the Germans as a center of colonial administration because of the temperate climate, Arusha is the perfect location to begin an overland safari in northern Tanzania. You might consider an optional coffee plantation tour and tasting, to enjoy the fruits of the estate.

Tonight, we'll have a pre-trip orientation, followed by a group dinner in the lodge. Then it's off to bed, we start our safari adventure in the morning!

Your safari begins after breakfast this morning. On our adventure we will be traveling overland crossing great swathes of the African plains and countryside, searching for the game herds and their ever-present predators.

We'll make our way towards Tarangire National Park, where open grasslands, acacia trees and the Tarangire River paint the wild landscape. Tarangire is one of Tanzania's richest reserves, known for its huge elephant population and baobab trees. It forms the center of the annual migratory cycle that includes up to 3000 elephant, 25,000 wildebeest and 30,000 zebras. Its high elephant population imparts a rare chance to get up close to these gentle giants, and there’s always the possibility of glimpsing some predators slinking through the savannah. A variety of ecosystems exist within the park boundary, providing a diverse range of wildlife with 94 species of mammals and over 500 bird species recorded.

In fact, after the Serengeti, Tarangire has the greatest concentration of wildlife in Tanzania and in the dry season the Tarangire River is a magnet for thirsty wildlife. Large herds of elephants and migratory wildebeest, zebra, buffalo, impala, gazelle, hartebeest and eland gather and not surprisingly the predators follow. This is also the one place in Tanzania where dry-country antelope such as oryx and gerenuk are regularly spotted. Tarangire is also known for its spectacular baobab trees, and its breathtaking views of the Maasai Steppe and the mountains to the south.

We'll spend the day in search of the animals, especially the large elephant population. Your trained guide shares exciting experiences and information about culture, fauna and flora as well as wild animals.
After our safari we'll find our way to our wilderness camp, where we'll spend the night in a luxury tented bush camp. If you’ve never experienced a luxury tent, you’re in for a true safari experience…with style! Tonight, we can enjoy drinks on the deck before sitting down to yet another outstanding African dinner. You’ll find the cuisine to be as impressive as the accommodations, too. Later tonight you might enjoy a drink under the stars, around the fire, as you review all of your stunning photos.

This morning after breakfast we'll leave Tarangire for a short drive northwest to the famed Ngorongoro Crater Conservation Area. This area includes the famous Crater and its lesser-known regions to the north; the Olduvai Gorge (where Lucy was found in 1974) and expansive plains of grassland which run all the way across to the Serengeti. Local Maasai herd their cattle and goats alongside Africa's famed wildlife, as they have for centuries.

Ngorongoro itself is the world's largest inactive and intact volcanic crater, which was formed three million years ago. We’ll embark on a spectacular drive up the crater wall to the rim, then descend to the floor of the crater to spend the day exploring this magnificent wildlife sanctuary. Being one of the largest calderas in the world, 12.4 miles wide and almost 2,000 feet tall, with a variety of animals and vegetation, Ngorongoro Crater is one of Tanzania’s most stunning areas. The vegetation includes grasslands, swamps, forests, saltpans, as well as a freshwater lake and has been compared to Noah's Ark or the Garden of Eden. With 20,000 grazing mammals and the world’s largest concentration of predators, you will have no trouble finding lion, elephant, buffalo and many of the plain's herbivores such as wildebeest, Thomson's gazelle, zebra and reedbuck, as well as thousands of flamingo wading in the shallows of Lake Magadi, the soda lake on the floor of the crater. If you're lucky you'll have a black rhino sighting, which is an absolute rarity elsewhere in this country. Within the steep walls of the crater not only will you find considerable movement of animals, but you may well come across local Maasai tribesmen (who have grazing rights here), tending their cattle.

This afternoon, after a picnic lunch in the crater near the hippo pool, we leave the crater and drive up the winding caldera wall road and head toward our lodge in the nearby town at the base of the volcano.

Early morning we'll depart to Lake Eyasi for a cultural experience with the nomadic hunter-gatherer Hadzabe tribe and the semi-nomadic pastoralist Datoga tribe. The Hadzabe inhabit the shore of Lake Nyasi, and with an estimated population of fewer than 2,000 individuals, the Hadzabe are one of the last tribes to stay true to their tribal history and culture. The skills they will demonstrate are not a mere performance. The bushmen rely on these techniques to survive, and you’ll need to be very attentive and at times quiet, while they demonstrate their use of locally made weapons and even poisons in incapacitating the creatures on which they depend for survival.

Also in the Lake Eyasi area are the Nilotic-speaking Datoga tribe, who are predominantly semi-nomadic pastoralists grazing cattle, goats, and sheep. During your visit to their homesteads, you'll learn about their way of life, animal tracking, medicinal plants, and their skill with simple blacksmithing.

Tonight, we return to our comfortable lodge for dinner and relaxation.

Ndutu is situated in the northern part of the Ngorongoro Conservation Area within the magnificent Serengeti. Lake Ndutu forms a shallow basin where water accumulates from the nearby areas of slightly higher altitude. The water in the lake is extremely saline, too saline for human consumption, but Lake Ndutu becomes alive with animals during the migration because it is surrounded by the Ndutu woodlands and the Short Grass Plains, which provide ample cover and food. From November to May, vast migratory herds visit the Ndutu area and provide a feast for the resident predators. Huge numbers of migratory birds come to the plains to feed and to escape the cold European winter. The lakes attract flocks of flamingos and other water birds. Animal viewing is excellent everywhere, as the surrounding landscapes are covered in sweeping grasslands which provide the perfect habitat for the migratory route for hundreds of thousands of wildebeest, antelope and zebra. Other commonly spotted species include leopard, lion, cheetah, caracal, serval, African wildcat, and a variety of prolific birdlife.

This morning after breakfast we'll head out in our safari vehicles to explore the rich ecosystem of the area. We'll follow the migrations paths to the Southern Serengeti corridor where each year, around the same time, the circular great wildebeest migration begins in the Ngorongoro Conservation Area of the southern Serengeti in Tanzania.

If time permits, we’ll stop and visit one of the remote Maasai villages along our route. Tall and thin, these semi-nomadic tribesmen are easily spotted by their brilliant red capes and easy-going demeanor. Their villages are surrounded by a large enclosure of thorny branches to protect their cattle, which make up their primary source of food, and are viewed as their wealth. The Maasai’s entire way of life truly revolves around their cattle. Interacting with them is often one of the highlights of the day!

Tonight, we'll stay in a true mobile tented camp in the Ndutu-South Serengeti area, our base of operations for the next two nights. The stunning display of stars tonight combined with the sounds of the wilderness will be an experience you won't soon forget.

Today we head out from our camp, to spend another day exploring the Ndutu-Serengeti wilderness, hoping to intercept some of the migration. This migration is a natural phenomenon determined by the availability of grazing. This phase lasts from approximately January to March, when the calving season begins – a time when there is plenty of rain-ripened grass available for the 260,000 zebra that precede 1.7 million wildebeest and the following hundreds of thousands of other plains game, including around 470,000 gazelles. Danger is everywhere for these animals as packs of lion, cheetahs and other carnivores are roaming throughout the area, waiting for the right moment to strike. The scenes are amazing!

Today we'll immerse one more time into a full safari adventure, spotting lions and leopards and in this area as well as relatively easy-to-sight cheetahs, especially where there are large amounts of prey such as gazelle. Our game drive will lead us into the central Seronera region of the Serengeti National Park, which sprawls across 5,757 square miles, and is Tanzania’s largest and most famous national park. Most of the park is open swathes of grassland, broken by isolated granite kopjes (hills) and patches of acacia woodlands. Famous for its cheetah, Cape buffalo, and large herds of giraffe, the chief herbivore of Serengeti is the wildebeest of which there are up to two million. The amazing annual migration of wildebeest herds is one of the biggest attractions of the Serengeti. It begins November at the northern end of the Serengeti National Park near the Kenyan border, when huge herds of these animals cross into Tanzania from the Maasai Mara area in Kenya to head for greener pastures in the South Serengeti and Ndutu. By December they've arrived and begin feeding on the lush short-grass plains. Now the zebras reach their peak of foaling, and the wildebeest and gazelle also give birth to their young. It's a predator haven with an abundance of game animals seen nowhere else on earth. We’ll have a box lunch today to allow us to stay moving through the stunning landscape of endless plains, dotted with animal herds.

Tonight, will find us at a different mobile tented bush camp, in yet another remote area of the Serengeti…enjoying a hearty dinner and a campfire. The evening ends listening to the sounds of the wild, watching the sun go down and gazing at the never-ending sky.

This morning we’ll enjoy a short game drive in the morning as we make our way to the small Serengeti Seronera airstrip for our flight back to Kilimanjaro International Airport (JRO). Depending on the flight times, by late morning or early afternoon your flight will be landing, in plenty of time to catch your flight home, which typically depart in the evening.