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A Taste of Tanzania

Highlights

  • Enjoy game drives in the Great Rift Valley, Ngorongoro Crater and the Serengeti
  • Visit one of the world's oldest archaeological sites at Olduvai Gorge
  • Stay in luxury safari camps where you sleep under the stars and enjoy relaxing by the campfire
From £3240 pp*
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7 Nights

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What you'll do

Overview

Tanzania is one of Africa's most epic countries to explore. Boasting the jaw-dropping wildebeest migration and the highest peak in Africa, this is your chance to explore Tanzania and experience the magical Serengeti, spot hippos wallowing in the wetlands of Ngorongoro Crater, and the tree-climbing lions of Lake Manyara National Park.

Your adventure begins when you arrive in Arusha International Airport, situated between Mount Kilimanjaro National Park and Lake Manyara National Park. After being transferred directly to your accommodation, you’ll then have the chance to either explore the local area or simply relax and re-energise, ready to begin your Tanzanian tour.

After your first night you’ll be whisked to Lake Manyara National Park, where you can spot wildlife as varied as elephants wandering through the forests, countless flamingos flocking on Lake Manyara, and even lions climbing the trees scattered throughout the savannah.

Here you’ll enjoy your first game drive and safari experience, before spending your first night in a luxurious safari camp under the stars. The next day, you’ll head up towards the wildlife jewel in Tanzania’s crown – the Serengeti.

This truly unique ecosystem supports a staggering amount of wildlife, with vast herds of wildebeest and zebra crossing the plains, as well as prides of lions, families of cheetah, elephants wandering the empty plains, rhino shuffling through the undergrowth, and much more.

You’ll spend three nights in the Serengeti at a safari camp that moves according to the season, to give you the best opportunity to spot the magnificent wildlife in the area. During your time in the Serengeti, you’ll also visit Olduvai Gorge, a site where remains of early humans have been discovered from as much as 2 million years ago.

Leave the Serengeti and head back south for Ngorongoro Crater, a UNESCO-listed natural site thought to be the world’s largest intact volcanic caldera. As with all the places you visit on this itinerary, the area supports vast amounts of wildlife, and you’ll have the opportunity for unique game drives in the crater where you can spot the Big Five, enjoy a picnic lunch in the wilderness, and settle into hides for world-class bird watching.

Your final stop will be in the heart of Tanzanian coffee country, and you’ll stay in a Plantation Lodge in the wilderness and spend your final day relaxing or exploring the local area, before you are taken back to Arusha Airport the next day.

By the time you leave us in Tanzania, we hope that you head home able to look back on a magical 8 days where you have visited spectacular landscapes, seen magnificent wildlife, and created treasured-memories in the heart of Africa.

Tour Summary:
Day 1: Arusha
Day 2: Lake Manyara National Park
Day 3- 5: Serengeti National Park
Day 6: Ngorongoro Crater
Day 7: Karatu
Day 8: Departure

*From price based on travel for 2 people in 2024. For larger groups or solo travellers please enquire directly to hello@nitgb.com

*Please note that all accommodation will be reserved at time of booking. Depending on availability there may be changes to similar accommodation.

Arrival Day

On arrival at Kilimanjaro or Arusha Airport you’ll be personally met and escorted by our driver-guide to the fashionable Arusha Hotel in the heart of Tanzania’s safari centre, where you’ll spend the night. Activities, including swimming, shopping, or visiting the Tanzanite Experience Museum for those who arrive early.

Otherwise simply relax, refresh after your journey and start getting excited for the epic adventure that awaits you.

Accommodation: Four Points by Sheraton Arusha The Arusha Hotel (or similar)

Meals: Dinner

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 (or similar)

Meals: 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 Maasai 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 Maasai 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.

The migration crosses the Grumeti river, in the Serengeti, heading North, usually around April or May.

Accommodation: Kirurumu Serengeti Central Camp (or similar)

Meals: 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.

Meals: 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 (or similar)

Meals: Breakfast, lunch 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 truly immersed yourself in the amazing nature and wildlife of Africa during your time here.

Meals: Breakfast and lunch

What's included

Included

  • Vehicle with an experienced English speaking driver guide
  • 1 night Arusha - HB*
  • 1 night Manyara - FB*
  • 3 nights Serengeti - FB
  • 1 night Ngorongoro - FB
  • 1 night Karatu HB
  • Game drive in Lake Manyara National Park
  • Daily game drives in Serengeti National Park
  • Visit to Olduvai Gorge and Olduvai Museum tour
  • Game drives in Ngorongoro Crater
  • Bottled water and/or soft drinks in vehicle during game drives
  • All entry fees for national parks, conservation fees, reserve fees relevant to this itinerary

Accommodation

Four Points by Sheraton Arusha The Arusha Hotel (or similar)

The Four Points by Sheraton Arusha is one of the oldest hotels in East Africa. Saturated with the history of a bygone era, the traditional ambience is effortlessly combined with the style and service you wish for when travelling.

The hotel features 114 stylish rooms, free Wi-Fi, a 24-hour gym, Parachichi a full-service restaurant, and as well as the famous Hatari Bar. The Parachichi Restaurant, meaning ‘avocado’ in Swahili, overlooks our beautiful garden and is the perfect place for breakfast, lunch or dinner.

Take a dip in our outdoor swimming pool and relax after a good workout in our gym with amazing views of the pool and gardens.

Kirurumu Manyara Lodge (or similar)

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.

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

Kirurumu Serengeti Central Camp (or similar)

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 accommodation is under canvas, each tent has an ensuite bathroom with flushing toilet and shower. The shower has hot water and is is a bucket shower operated by the camp staff on demand.

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.

Ngorongoro Serena Lodge (or similar)

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.

There is an on-site restaurant, bar and spa.

The Plantation Lodge (or similar)

The Plantation Lodge is situated near the town of Karatu 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.

Plantation Lodge is located on landscaped grounds spanning a total of ten hectares. All rooms and suites within the lodge are unique and have been furnished with great attention to detail. There is a restaurant on-site. After your safari, there are many ways of
seeing out the day in a relaxed manner, bathing in the pool, indulging in a massage, going for a walk in the garden or enjoying
a sundowner on the bar’s terrace.

Your local host

Steven and Team

Steven is a Maasai who grew up in Arusha and became prominent in the national parks service. He rose to the rank of senior ranger of Tarangire National Park before embarking on a career in tourism.

Steven is a Maasai who grew up in Arusha and became prominent in the national parks service. He rose to the rank of senior ranger of Tarangire National Park before embarking on a career in tourism.

Steven and Team image

Location

Your adventure begins from the moment you land in Arusha International Airport in the north of the country, where you are transferred immediately to your accommodation to relax, refresh, and get ready for your journey through Tanzania.

From there, you’ll head westwards to Lake Manyara National Park and the Great Rift Valley, before you head into the wilderness of the Serengeti, far to the north of the country, not far from the border with Kenya. The final half of your adventure is spent heading to the spectacular Ngorongoro Crater, before your final stop in coffee country, closer to Karatu.

From there, you’ll head back to Arusha for your flight home, hopefully having enjoyed exploring this magnificent corner of Africa.

FAQs

How much should I tip?

There is a strong tipping culture in Tanzania, but it can be hard to know exactly how much to tip for what service. Here are some guidelines as to what is generally expected of tips:

Safari driver/guide - US$20 per day as a total for the whole group on safari, not per person (i.e. $20 per car used per day).

In lodges - Service charges are almost always included in lodges on the Northern Safari Circuit. If clients wish to leave a tip, then there is usually a tip box provided at reception. Gratuities placed in the tip box are generally divided amongst the entire staff on a monthly basis. Tips are not normally given on receipt of meals and it is advised that if clients wish to leave a tip for services received, then they leave it in the tip box at the end of their stay. A guideline of US$5 per day is reasonable.

Porters - If someone carries your bag to/from your vehicle at a lodge, then a reasonable guideline is US$2.

What should I wear for safari?

· Should be comfortable, preferably not in bright colours.
· Shorts.
· Trousers for the evening (and day if very hot).
· Sleeved shirts (to roll down against the sun or insects).
· Comfortable boots or shoes.
· Walking boots (already broken in!), especially if walking or trekking.
· A fleece or sweater - the nights can be cool in the bush and Ngorongoro cold after dark.
· A good, wide brimmed, hat.
· Sunglasses and sun block/screen.
· At least 2 changes of clothing for safari.
· In the evenings, especially at Lodges, a change of informal, casual clothes for dinner.
If you are travelling during rainy season - usually November and April / May- a shower proof jacket is useful.

What is the climate like?

The long dry season lasts throughout June, July, August, September and October when rainfall is unusual, even on the islands. Temperatures vary hugely with altitude and location, but it's usually a fine, clear sky and sunny weather.

The rainy season is between April - May and November, it is usually short bursts of very heavy rain followed by sunshine. The rain doesn't usually last long, but can be heavy and so a shower proof jacket and walking boots rather than trainers are recommended.

What is the currency?

Tanzanian Shilling (TSHs) is the local currency but the US $ in cash is the preferred option.

Food options on safari?

Most camps and lodges will serve Western-style food, game lodges tend to offer a daily set menu with a limited selection, so if you are a vegetarian or have any other specific dietary requirements please let us know so we can advise our host.

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