6 Days Tarangire, Serengeti & Ngorongoro Mid-Range Safari

After breakfast at the lodge, begin your journey to explore one of Tanzania’s most rewarding national parks, a land of big baobab trees, big elephants, and big cats. No wonder this ends up being the favorite park in Tanzania for many visitors. Sightings of wildebeest, giraffes, hippos, buffaloes, baboons, vervet monkeys, and zebras are also almost guaranteed. Lions are plentiful here – Tarangire is home to one of Tanzania’s healthiest lion populations. While you’ll have to work a little harder to see a cheetah or leopard, it will only enhance your excitement when you do. You can also look forward to classic safari scenery – savannah plains, river woodlands, and rocky hills.
You will enjoy a picnic lunch in the park and continue your game-viewing in the afternoon to witness more of Tarangire’s wildlife. Afterwards, we’ll head to our lodgings, a lodge in the midst of the Ngorongoro highlands. Dinner will be served at the lodge. In the evening, you are free to remain in the lounge area to discuss the day’s activities or share pictures of the animals you saw with friends and family at home.

After breakfast at the lodge, drive through the Ngorongoro Conservation Area before descending 610 meters down to the grasslands of the crater floor, an area of about 265 square kilometers. Despite its small size, the Crater is a Big Five country and the openness of the terrain means easy and rewarding game viewing. You will spend 7 hours exploring the crater floor, stopping at a picnic on the grasslands amidst the grazing herds.
Formed by a massive volcanic eruption, the world’s largest intact and un-flooded caldera provides a year-round home to an astonishing 25,000 large mammals including black rhino, wildebeest, and zebra, along with Africa’s densest concentrations of hyena. The Crater’s forests shelter elephants and buffalo, and its wetlands are home to hippos and flamingos while lions, jackals, leopards, and caracals make up the full range of predators.
After lunch, you leave the crater behind and drive to the Serengeti National Park. You’ll reach our carefully selected tented camp by mid-afternoon and have time to settle in before dinner.

After breakfast at the camp, set out to explore the vast expanse of the Serengeti, where the wildlife sightings are typically at their peak in the early mornings and late afternoons, when the temperature cools. The multitude and diversity of wildlife species in this huge protected area are unrivaled anywhere on the planet. Serengeti, in fact, is the Maasai word that means “endless plain.”
Return to camp in between game-viewing drives for lunch at the main dining tent. After time to relax, head out again on the afternoon game-viewing drive. Your guides will help identify the more elusive animal species, such as bat-eared fox and golden jackal, as well as rare birds like the purple grenadier and the red-cheeked cordon bleu. Try spotting the odd-looking Secretary bird.
Dinner is served at the main dining tent. In the evening, remain in the tent area or around the campfire to discuss the day’s activities with other travelers, or turn in early to rest.

After breakfast at the camp, enjoy your last morning game drive in the Serengeti. The Serengeti is famous for its vast open grasslands which allow for excellent sightings of wildlife. Its climate and vegetation have remained largely untouched for millions of years. Whilst it boasts abundant wildlife, it is perhaps best known for the annual Great Migration. Vast numbers of wildebeest, accompanied by large numbers of zebra and antelope, move in an annual pattern constantly seeking fresh grazing.
In addition to the iconic landscapes, you have a good chance of encountering predators and may see lion, cheetah, and leopard. It is a truly life-changing experience. In the afternoon, start your journey back to Karatu, hopefully enjoying more wildlife sightings along the way.
In the evening, you are free to relax in the main dining lounge area to discuss the day's wildlife with other travelers, or retire to your room to rest.

After breakfast at the lodge, depart for Lake Manyara, a fantastic and relatively compact park. Expect dramatic scenery of cliffs, forest, and lake all in a relatively small area. Lake Manyara is famous for its elephants that roam the forests, its gregarious troops of olive baboons, and its lions which, unusually, climb trees. It’s a unique combination that offers something a little different to the other parks in Tanzania’s north.
Enjoy a final game drive and picnic lunch in the park before heading back to Arusha or being dropped off at the airport for your flight. This marks the end of your safari in Tanzania.