Dry Season Spectacular

Arrival at Kilimanjaro Airport

Whenever you arrive at Tanzania's Kilimanjaro airport, you'll be personally met and privately transferred to the Arusha Serena Hotel. Set among the woodland slopes of Mount Meru at the edge of Lake Duluti, there’s no better destination for soaking in the beauty and magnificence of the Tanzanian northern safari circuit. Dinner and overnight at Arusha Serena Hotel.
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Leave early to maximize your exciting first game drive in Lake Manyara National Park. The park is an UNESCO biosphere and one of the most scenic on the circuit. Game view through thick, magical forests onto savanna grasslands, and finally to the great lake shore itself. You'll see a huge variety of animals from giraffe, zebra, wildebeest, warthog and much more. Enjoy a picnic lunch overlooking the scene that was the opening for the movie, Out of Africa. In the afternoon continue into the Ngorongoro Conservation Area on a spectacular drive through the Ngorongoro rain forest. Continue around the rim to Ngorongoro Serena Safari Lodge for dinner and overnight.
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Dawn game drive in Ngorongoro Crater National Park descending through a glen of rare Lehai acacia, Africa's "bonzaii" acacia. Once on the floor you'll understand why this is so often referred to as "Africa's Garden of Eden." There are dozens of lion, hundreds of hyaena and jackal, and large numbers of plains game. Enjoy your picnic breakfast beside a lake usually frequented by hippo. Return to the lodge for a late lunch and in the afternoon take a second game drive on the crater floor or visit a nearby Maasai village. Dinner and overnight at Ngorongoro Serena Safari Lodge.
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This morning you retrace your route slightly past Lake Manyara and then turn south into Tarangire National Park. Enjoy a picnic lunch as you explore the northern sector of this massive thickly wooded park famous for its elephant and leopard before continuing into the afternoon to Tarangire Sopa Lodge for dinner and overnight.
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Further game viewing today in a park that really excels in game viewing during the dry season. This is when literally thousands of elephant migrate into the park to dig for water that flows under the Tarangire sand river. The elephant and other game are also drawn to the great Silale Swamp, with its shores filled with exotic birds and several lion prides. The heavy woods of the park are perfect habitat for leopard, and in Tarangire they are among the largest found on the circuit. Meals and overnight at Tarangire Sopa Lodge.
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Today you depart Tanzania for Kenya. After a short drive through the Tarangire park to the gate, continue to Arusha city in time to catch the noon commuter flight to Kilimanjaro airport. There you exit the country through immigration and customs before taking the international flight that is scheduled to arrive Kenya's smaller Wilson airport around 2:30p. Tumaini will introduce you to EWT's Kenyan drivers and guides and you then head north of the city into the Kikuyu highlands, arriving the Aberdare Country Club for dinner and overnight.
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The day (and night!) is spent in the amazing Aberdare National Park, the great highland rainforest park that gives you scenery and animals that can be found nowhere else in East Africa. At the lower altitudes around 7,000' in the very beautiful forests you'll find elephant, buffalo and a variety of smaller game like bushbuck, with the chance of seeing some really rare animals like colobus monkey. The birdlife is wonderful, including the dinosaur-like white-casqued hornbill. But you'll go higher, through the bamboo forest onto the tundra where there's a chance of finding the very rare mountain reedbuck.

Enjoy a picnic lunch overlooking a series of spectacular waterfalls. Then at the end of the day descend to the forests again for dinner and overnight game viewing at The Ark tree hotel, Kenya's best tree hotel. Here you watch the endless parade of Africa as all sorts of animals come to the natural water hole and salt lick over which the lodge has been built. Many find it difficult to leave the viewing platforms for the sleep which comes so easily in the cold mountain air!
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Leave The Ark this morning for a spectacular drive around the high perimeter of Mt. Kenya where its imposing glaciers blast out at you when the high clouds clear. After driving through beautiful wheat and grain fields you suddenly head down onto the formidable desert. In a mere 45-minutes you're driving on the Northern Frontier where there is little but scrub acacia and cactus. You travel through the last major town of Isiolo before heading into a mostly vacant landscape that makes you wonder what you're doing here! But shortly you arrive at the great Ewaso Nyiro River and the desert blooms! Flowering trees and giant palms line the riverbanks and the verdant landscape for about a mile out from the banks draws an enormous amount of game, some of it very rare. Dinner and overnight at Larsen's Camp beautifully set along the river.
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The day is spent game viewing in this marvelous wilderness unlike anything else in Africa. The landscape reminds many of Arizona, but the animals are unique! There are plenty of elephant, impala, buffalo and other standard game, but the gems of the area include those found only here: the world's prettiest giraffe, the reticulated; the very rare Grevy's zebra; the long-necked gerenuk; the oryx and a number of spectacular birds.

In addition to your multiple game drives you have the opportunity here to visit a Samburu village. The Samburu and allied groups are experts in desert survival, surviving on barely a few inches of rain annually. Their growing villages are clustered around the great Ewaso Nyrio River and they live harmoniously with the wild game as they have for aeons.

Meals and overnight at Larsen's Camp.
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Game view this morning back to the airstrip for the late morning flight into Kenya's best reserve, the Maasai Mara. The spectacular flight skirts the great glaciers of Mt. Kenya and then sails over a number of beautiful Great Rift Valley lakes before landing in the northeast salient of the reserve, just after noon. You'll be met by Landrovers from prestigious Governor's Camp that will take you on a short game drive into camp for dinner and overnight.
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Three game drives are offered daily from camp: dawn, mid-day and afternoon. The camp is beautifully located right along the Mara River, and all sorts of game wander through camp or can be seen along the river. You can book a number of options as well, including a hot air balloon ride over the herds, escorted game walks, and Maasai village visits. Activities, meals and overnight at Governor's Camp.
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During the dry season the Mara is the setting for the greatest wildlife spectacular on earth, the great migration. Of course nothing in the wild can ever be guaranteed, but if the weather is normal, hundreds of thousands of wildebeest and zebra will migrate into the Mara by the end of June and remain there until well into November. Even without the migration the Mara is one of the finest reserves in Africa, with abundant big game that is resident year round. This includes lots of predators. The Mara has the highest density of lion of any big game wilderness in Africa. Activities, meals and overnight at Governor's Camp.
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After a final morning of game viewing and one last sumptuous buffet breakfast along the Mara River, you travel to the airstrip for the flight back to Nairobi scheduled to arrive at noon. You'll be personally met and taken to the city's most luxurious hotel, the Norfolk Hotel. Your private room is available until you are personally transferred to the airport late tonight for your overnight flight to Europe.
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