Walk Your Way Across
Tanzania
Explore the endless plains of the Serengeti in the same manner as those whose home it has been for a millennia, on foot! For four days, experience the ultimate communing with nature as you walk among Tanzania's endless variety of wildlife. Your private fly tent camp is moved each day by your camp crew. Dine beneath the stars and camp with a few extra amenities such as canvas cot beds. Continue by vehicle across Tanzania and descend 2,000 feet by Land Rover into Ngorongoro Cater. See some of the earliest fossils of man in nearby Olduvai Gorge and trek in Tarangire enjoying the permanent pleasures of your luxury lodge and tented camp along the way.
Days 1/2 - New York/Arusha
Fly via KLM/Northwest Airlines to Amsterdam and connect to Tanzania. Upon arrival next evening in Arusha, you are escorted to your beautifully-landscaped lodge. SERENA MOUNTAIN VILLAGE. (Meals Aloft)
Days 3/4/5/6 - Serengeti Walking Safari
Morning flight to Serengeti National Park, what the Maasai refer to as Siringitu "the place where the land moves on forever." Here, life's possibilities seem as infinite as the endless variety of wildlife you will see on a mixture of game walks and drives across the vast plains: lion, leopard, cheetah, and their prey: giraffe, topi, buffalo and impala. The kopjes (prehistoric rock outcroppings) host hyraxes, dwarf mongooses, and red-headed agamas, and often a sleepy black-maned lion or leopard. The open grassland is home to large groups of Thomson's and Grant's gazelles, spotted hyena and jackal. This is where the drama of the migration unfolds each year, as more than two million wildebeest, accompanied by thousands of zebras and other herbivores, cross the Serengeti in search of fertile grasslands.
Each day you cover 10-15 miles on game walks. Most of the time is spent in the Gol Mountains, Olduvai, Matiti and Piyaya areas, depending on the local conditions and the movement of wildlife. Hikes are along mountain ridges, Lake Eyasi, and the numerous rivers that carve their way through the magnificent plains. You learn to follow the spore of the wildlife around you, the hunting patterns of the carnivores and defense strategies of their prey, and the medicinal uses of the plants you see. Visit villages of the local Maasai people, living much as their ancestors have for centuries. Your evenings are spent under canvas at your private fly camp. Your walk-in tents have two canvas cot beds with bed linen, bedside table and luggage rack, and a small verandah with table, mirror and canvas washstand. There is an adjacent private toilet and a shared bucket shower. Your crew is on hand to move camp, prepare and serve meals and take care of all your needs. Meals are served under a canopy of stars or in a light dining tent with canvas sides. PRIVATE FLY CAMPS. (All Meals Daily)
Days 7/8 - Olduvai Gorge/Ngorongoro Conservation Area
Embark on a scenic drive to Olduvai Gorge, passing through a spectacular mix of savannah grassland and volcanic hills, where red-robed Maasai graze their cattle, before it drops steeply down into the gorge itself. One of the world's most important paleoanthropological sites, it is here in 1959, where Mary and Louis Leakey found 1.7-million-year-old Zinjanthropus and Homo Habilis (Handyman). A Tanzanian guide explains the geological features of the gorge and the work of the Leakey's. Continue to the Ngorongoro Crater, a World Heritage site, and descend 2,000 feet into seemingly the land that time forgot. The mist which often obscures the crater floor of this extinct volcano from the surface often reveals elephant lumbering through the primeval forest, lion resting in the tall grass, black rhino grazing and the distinctive grunt of the hippo as you lunch overlooking their pool. Your lodge is built into the rim of the crater. Each room has private terraces so your first and last glimpse of the day will be the magical crater below. NGORONGORO SERENA SAFARI LODGE. (B,L,D Daily)
Days 9/10 - Tarangire National Park
Journey across the gently rolling countryside adorned with majestic baobab trees to Tarangire National Park. On your daily game drives you may see herds of wildebeest, zebra, elephant, eland and oryx which gather in Tarangire until the onset of the rains when they migrate to good grazing areas. Enjoy nature walks, foot safaris and extended bush trekking, and see some of the over 300 bird species that call Tarangire home. The Maasais invite you into their homesteads for an insight into the customs and lifestyle of this fascinating ethnic group or to join in the traditional dancing around the campfire lit in the kraal area. A community conservation fee is paid to the local villages for every passenger bednight and is used to develop community-chosen projects such as schools, water boreholes, roads and dispensaries. Then return to enjoy your luxury tented camp's elegant furnishings, superior service and campfire hospitality. On a spotlit night drive you may see the same lion that had been lazing in the sun that day, alert and sleek on the prowl. KIKOTI CAMP. (B,L,D Daily)
Days 11/12 - Arusha/Amsterdam/New York
Drive back to Arusha. Shop or relax in your dayroom at SERENA MOUNTAIN VILLAGE. After dinner, transfer to the airport for your flights home. (B,L,D;Meals Aloft)
Optional Extension To Selous Game Reserve
For more exciting wildlife viewing on foot, boat and vehicle, head to the Selous, the largest park in Tanzania, which boasts an impressive variety of mammals, birdlife and wild flowers in a mosaic of wooded hills, open miombo woodland and grassy plains and marshes. The Rufiji River has some of the highest concentrations of hippo and crocodile on the continent, and Afica's endangered wild dog thrives in the park. Swim in a remote hot spring and boat upstream to the rocky cliffs of Stieglers' Gorge that have over the years provided some of the best leopard sightings in the region. Enjoy outstanding cuisine, expert guiding, and all your creature comforts in your private mobile tented camp.
Your Safari Includes:
- Round trip air between New York and Arusha; the extension returns from Dar es Salaam.
- Domestic flights within Tanzania.
- Superior accommodations as indicated.
- All meals as specified.
- All wildlife viewing by either safari minibus with pop-up roof hatch or private Land Rover, driven by a naturalist guide.
- Professional naturalist with minimum 10 tour members.
- Complimentary bottled water and set of field glasses in vehicles.
- Gratuities for baggage handling, hotel tips and taxes.
- All game park entry fees.
- Complimentary backpack, baggage tags and passport wallet.