4-Day Tarangire, Serengeti and Ngorongoro Group Safari

Tarangire National Park: elephants and baobabs

Tarangire lies about 120 kilometres south-west of Arusha, two to two and a half hours by road, and covers roughly 2,850 square kilometres along the Tarangire River. The river is the only permanent water for a huge area, so in the dry season from June to October it pulls in some of the largest elephant herds in East Africa, along with zebra, wildebeest, buffalo, giraffe and the lions that follow them. The landscape is unlike the Serengeti: rolling hills studded with giant baobab trees, some many centuries old, and swamps alive with birds.

Day one is a full day here, with a morning game drive after arrival, lunch at a picnic site in the park and an afternoon drive before camp. A Tarangire day safari from Arusha is often skipped by short itineraries, which is why adding it makes this four-day route so good: you see elephants close up on day one and have the Serengeti still ahead of you. Sightings vary with the season and are never guaranteed.

Serengeti National Park and its great plains

On day two you drive from Tarangire through Karatu and across the Ngorongoro highlands, stopping at the crater rim viewpoint, then down past Olduvai Gorge to the Naabi Hill gate of the Serengeti. The park is about 14,750 square kilometres of grassland and acacia savannah, listed by UNESCO in 1981 and famous for the Great Migration of wildebeest and zebra that circles it through the year. You arrive in time for an afternoon game drive in the central Seronera area, where lions, cheetahs and leopards are seen most often.

Day three begins before sunrise, the best hour of any Serengeti safari from Arusha, when predators are still hunting and the light on the plains is golden. After the morning drive you return to camp for lunch and then set off towards Ngorongoro. The best time to visit the Serengeti depends on what you want: June to October for dry-season concentrations at the rivers, December to March for the calving season on the southern plains.

Ngorongoro Crater: the last morning

The Ngorongoro Crater is a collapsed volcano about 19 kilometres across, with a 260-square-kilometre floor some 600 metres below the rim. It sits inside the Ngorongoro Conservation Area, a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1979 where Maasai herders share the land with wildlife. On day four you descend the rim road early for a game drive across open grassland, the Lerai forest, the Gorigor swamp and the shores of Lake Magadi, where flamingos gather in season.

The crater holds a dense, resident population: lions, elephants, buffalo, hyenas, hippos and one of Tanzania's few remaining groups of black rhino, so it is one of the best places on the continent to complete the Big Five. Vehicles may stay about six hours on the floor; after a picnic lunch you climb out and drive about three and a half hours back to Arusha, arriving in the afternoon. Is the Ngorongoro Crater worth visiting at the end of a safari? For most guests it is the grand finale.

Camping on safari: tents, campsites and meals

This is a camping safari, so you sleep in dome tents with sleeping mattresses at campsites near Tarangire, inside the Serengeti and near the crater rim. The campsites have shared toilets and showers, and the safari chef cooks breakfast, lunch (often a packed lunch on game-drive days) and a hot dinner, with mineral water throughout. Halal, vegetarian and other dietary needs are arranged if you tell us at booking. The group is limited to seven travellers, so the vehicle is never crowded.

Nights near the crater rim can fall to about 5°C, so a warm jumper, socks and a jacket are essential; luggage is limited to about 10 kg per person in a soft bag, and your Arusha hotel can store the rest. Safari camping is simple but memorable: the sounds of hyenas and lions at night, a sky full of stars and a hot breakfast before dawn.

Arusha, the gateway and the road between the parks

Arusha is the starting point of the northern safari circuit and sits between Mount Meru and the plains, about 50 kilometres from Kilimanjaro International Airport. We pick you up from your hotel at about 07:00 on day one and you are back in town on the afternoon of day four, which leaves time for an evening flight or a transfer to Zanzibar the next day. If you arrive the night before, tell us your hotel and we will confirm it is within the pickup area.

The road network between the parks is part of the experience: tarmac to Karatu, then rough park roads where the pop-up roof stays open. Distances are long, roughly 330 kilometres from Arusha to the central Serengeti, so the days include several hours of driving, broken by game viewing. Guests often ask how to get from Arusha to the Serengeti; on this safari the journey is simply the first two days of wildlife watching.