This is a tour to the best of the Northern Park of Tanzania, the Serengeti. The parks are home to small and large animals including birds and reptiles. Afterwards, we go game viewing in the wildlife-rich Ngorongoro Crater and Tarangire National Park, which is home to elephants. Finally, we will go to the Northern Safari Circuit, as well as explore Zanzibar Island – enjoying its beaches, spices, cultures, and water activities.
Tour Plan
Day 1 – Tarangire National Park
Depart Arusha and drive to Tarangire National Park for a game drive in the park. In the afternoon, enjoy a hot meal that will be prepared by your guide. In the evening, drive to the lodge for dinner and your overnight stay. The park is located slightly off the main safari route. Tarangire National Park is a lovely quiet park in Northern Tanzania that is most famous for its elephant migration, birding, and quiet authentic safari atmosphere. The majority of travellers to the region either miss out on Tarangire altogether or venture into the park for a matter of hours, leaving parts of Tarangire virtually untouched.
Day 2 – Serengeti National Park – Central Seronera
After breakfast, drive to Serengeti National Park with a game drive en-route. In the afternoon, a hot meal/lunch will be served at the park then you’ll have an afternoon game drive in Serengeti. In the evening, check in to the lodge for dinner and your overnight stay. There are a million wildebeest each one driven by the same ancient rhythm, fulfilling its instinctive role in the inescapable cycle of life. Witness a frenzied three-week bout of territorial conquests and mating; survival of the fittest as 40km (25 miles) long columns plunge through crocodile-infested waters on the annual exodus north; replenishing the species in a brief population explosion that produces more than 8,000 calves daily before the 1,000 km (600 miles) pilgrimage begins again.
Day 3 – Serengeti National Park – Central Seronera
Depart after breakfast for a full day game drive in the park. A hot lunch meal will be served and prepared by your guide. In the evening, head back to the lodge for dinner and your overnight stay. Tanzania’s oldest and most popular national park is also a World Heritage Site and recently proclaimed a 7th Worldwide Wonder. The Serengeti is famed for its annual migration, when some six million hooves pound the open plains, as more than 200,000 zebra and 300,000 Thomson’s gazelle join the wildebeest’s trek for fresh grazing. Yet even when the migration is quiet, the Serengeti offers arguably the most scintillating game-viewing in Africa. There are great herds of buffalo, smaller groups of elephant and giraffe, and thousands upon thousands of eland, topi, kongoni, impala, and Grant’s gazelle.
Day 4 – Ngorongoro Crater
Have an early breakfast and after breakfast, drive to Ngorongoro for the full day game drive in the crater. Lunch will be served on a full table set and a hot meal is prepared by your guide with soft cold drinks. Late in the afternoon, drive to the lodge for dinner and your overnight stay. The jewel in Ngorongoro’s crown is a deep, volcanic crater, the largest unflooded and unbroken caldera in the world. It’s about 20km across, 600m deep, and 300 sq km in area. The Ngorongoro Crater is a breathtaking natural wonder. 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.
Day 5 – Lake Manyara National Park – Zanzibar
After breakfast, drive to Lake Manyara National Park for the morning game drive in the park. A hot meal will be served as lunch. After lunch, drive back to Arusha for a drop off at the airport and the flight to Zanzibar. On arrival, you will be met and greeted then transferred to the hotel in Stone Town for dinner and your overnight stay. Manyara provides the perfect introduction to Tanzania’s birdlife. More than 400 bird species have been recorded, and even a first-time visitor to Africa might reasonably expect to observe 100 of these in one day. Inland of the floodplain is a narrow belt of acacia woodland, the favoured haunt of Manyara’s legendary tree-climbing lions and impressively tusked elephants.
Day 6 – Zanzibar Beach Island
Enjoy a leisurely breakfast at the hotel, followed by a Stone Town Tour and Spice Tour. In the afternoon, transfer to North Nungwi Beach for dinner and your overnight stay at the hotel. We have developed a special Spice Tour with in depth information not only about spices, but also organically grown herbs and a detailed description of their traditional uses in medicine cosmetics and cooking. After the tour, we’ll invite you for an opulent lunch at our guides’ home where you can taste the spices and fruits.
Day 7 – Zanzibar Beach Island
Today you will have breakfast at the hotel and a full day of relaxing at the beach. Any sea sport will be organized from the hotel at an extra cost. In the evening, enjoy dinner and your overnight stay at the hotel. Right on the northernmost point of the island, the beach that surrounds this area is truly stunning. Azure waters and white sands are what awaits those that come here. The only drawback really is that many of the hotels have had to perch on the coral cliffs that run north from the village and as such lose their beaches at high tide. Generally, however, this is not a problem with the small backpacker community in the village.
Day 8 – Zanzibar Beach Island
Enjoy a leisurely breakfast at the hotel and have a full day of relaxing at the beach. Any sea sport will be organized. In the evening, enjoy dinner and your overnight stay at the hotel. Zanzibar is the majestic spice island of the Indian Ocean. These are the two main islands of Unguja and Pemba. Over centuries, different cultures have influenced Zanzibar to become what it is today. Sumerians, Assyrians, Egyptians, Phonecians, Indians, Chinese, Persians, Portuguese, Omani, Arabs, Dutch and British have settled here at one time or another and influenced the local culture into the present fusion.
Day 9 – Zanzibar – Departure
Depart after breakfast and drive to Stone Town for the last-minute sightseeing. Proceed to the airport for the drop off ready to catch your flight back home. That is where our Tanzania safari and beach holiday will end.
