We bow to the fact: Many of us are firmly engaged in a very busy world, a world in which time away from the busyness is precious. And so we offer this safari to four major contributors to the East African mystique: the classic game lands of Tarangire, Manyara,the Ngorongoro Crater, and the fabled Serengeti—all in a mere but marvelous 17days.
On arrival at Kilimanjaro Airport, you will meet our driver guide who will transfer you to Arusha for Dinner and Overnight
After a breakfast topped off by some of the freshest and best coffee we will ever imbibe, we will be briefed by our safari specialist and set off on a marvelously African drive to Tarangire and our home for the next couple of nights.
At Tarangire’s wonderfully varied landscapes of rocky outcrops, rolling hills, and golden savannah generously strewn with acacias and baobabs, home to just about the entire cast of wild African characters— and some rare stars, like kudu and oryx — in addition to 2,500 or so elephants. We’ll spend a day in the bush discovering the big game and spying dozens of species of birds cavorting in the trees of Tarangire, and if we’re still keen to see more all-star creatures.
The park is roughly the size of Luxemburg and covers an area of about 2,600 km². Bush savannah, seasonal swamps, and giant baobab trees make up the landscape of this nature reserve and the park is probably one of the best places in East Africa to see elephants. Not only are there thousands, but they are also relatively accustomed to vehicles so you will be able to get close to them. Apart from elephants, the park is also home to Masai giraffes, various gazelles, antelopes, buffaloes, lions, leopards, baboons, and more than 500 types of birds, later in the evening back to the lodge.
After breakfast, we will travel from Tarangire to the lush highlands where crops such as wheat, corn, and coffee are grown. Traveling through the Ngorongoro Conservation Area you might stop for a breath-taking view over the Ngorongoro Crater before you continue to the Serengeti National Park. Serengeti means “endless plains” in the language of the Masai and you will see the grassland savannah stretching to the horizon. Bizarre rock formations dot the grassy landscape where predators roam. Blue wildebeests, Thomson’s gazelles, zebras, and buffaloes are on the menu. Through the high and open roof of the safari vehicle, you will be able to enjoy the diversified habitats and landscapes of the park
How can one convey the power of Serengeti?” asked Cyril Connolly in The Evening Colonnade. “It is an immense, limitless lawn, under a marquee of the sky. . . .The light is dazzling, the air delectable; kopjes rise out of the grass at far intervals, some wooded; the magic of the American prairie here blends with the other magic of the animals as they existed before man.”
The Serengeti sometimes does remind us of the American prairie, but in truth, it can’t be compared with any other place on earth. Its kopje-dotted landscape, its vast and billowing skies, and especially its astounding wealth of wildlife make it one-of-a-gorgeous-kind
5&6&7 Dinner and Overnight at Different accommodation
8&9 Dinner and Overnight at Different accommodation
After breakfast, you’ll depart for Ngorongoro Conservation; considered by some to be the Eighth Wonder of the World. When you get your first glimpse of this vast, verdant caldera from the panoramic viewpoint, you’ll soon understand why it has earned such a lofty reputation. Home to over 120 species of mammal including the fabled Big Five, the Ngorongoro Conservation Area is one of the most sought-after safari destinations in the world. It’s a particularly good place to see the endangered black rhinoceros enjoying a lonely meal out on the grass plains, as well as a place to see large numbers of hippopotami enjoying the cool water. From the comfort of your open-top vehicle, you’ll be able to observe and photograph some of Africa’s most recognizable faces.
The whole day will be spent on a game drive i. The areas you will visit depend upon the location of the herds. During the short rainy season in November and December, the herds move from the hills in the north to the plains in the south while during the longer rainy season from April to June they return up north. This circle of life is determined by the rainfalls and the locations of the herds might vary from year to year but your guide will know where to find the animals and where to see them best.
We will make the thrilling drive up to one of the earth’s wonders, the great, green, animal-nurturing caldera of a once catastrophically cranky, now beneficently mellow volcano, the Ngorongoro. Winding up to the crater’s rim puts us at Vail and Aspen altitudes of well over 7,000 feet, and being up that high, figuratively and actually, we may recall Isak Dinesen’s words in Out of Africa, “The air of the African highlands went to my head like wine, I was all the time slightly drunk with it.” And then we zoom down to the Lost World’s lush and park-like floor (but which, make no mistake, is an animal, not a human, kingdom)
Early in the morning after breakfast, You will descend over 600 meters into the crater to view wildlife. Supported by a year-groundwater supply and fodder, the Ngorongoroconservation area supports Aavast variety of animals, which include herds of wildebeest, zebra, buffalo, eland, warthog, hippo, and giant African elephants. Another big draw card to this picturesque national park is its dense population of predators, which include lions, hyenas, jackals, cheetahs, and the ever-elusive leopard, which sometimes requires a trained eye to spot. We will visit Lake Magadi, a large but shallow alkaline lake in the southwestern corner, which is one of the main features of the crater. A large number of flamingos, hippos, and other water birds can usually be seen here.
After breakfast, transfer to Lake Manyara National Park. We arrive in time after lunch we head into the Lake Manyara National Park for an afternoon game drive. This national park is one of Tanzania’s most dramatically located wildlife areas, consisting of a massive but shallow soda lake (covering two-thirds of the park), located at the foot of the Great Rift Valley’s western escarpment. The park’s varied habitat attracts a wide variety of animals, including one of Africa’s largest concentrations of elephants, Lake Manyara’s unique tree-climbing lions (rare), as well as large flocks of flamingos attracted by the algae in the lake.
We will have a full game viewing in Lake Manyara.The lake is a birder’s heaven, (it’s frequented by 300 migratory species), and the water from its Crater Highlands–supplied springs makes it a forested redoubt for all the most glamourous large mammals, including the famed Manyara tree-climbing lions. (It’s a little irreverent, but tree-lounging might be a better description.)
After breakfast, you will be dropped to the airport to connect to your flight to the next destination or back home
