9 Days Best of Kenya and Tanzania Wildlife Adventure Safari

You are met at the airport or your hotel for breakfast and a full briefing on the safari. The drive southwest stops at the Great Rift Valley viewpoint and for lunch at Narok, and on arrival at the reserve an afternoon game drive gets things going. Dinner and overnight at the lodge or camp.

A full day in the reserve with a picnic lunch carried with you. The Mara’s rolling grassland and dense track network make it the most dependable place in Kenya for close big cat sightings, and lion, cheetah and leopard are all resident. Lunch is taken at Hippo Pool among the hippo and crocodile. Dinner and overnight at your lodge or camp.

An early morning balloon flight over the reserve can be arranged at additional cost.

After breakfast there is the option of visiting a Maasai homestead before you leave the reserve. The route then runs north through the Rift Valley to Lake Nakuru National Park, arriving in time for dinner and overnight at your hotel or lodge.

A morning game drive in the park. Nakuru holds a protected population of white rhino and a smaller number of black, and Cape buffalo and waterbuck are usually somewhere along the shoreline. The birding is the other reason to come: around 400 species have been recorded here. Lunch en route to Nairobi, arriving in the evening for dinner and overnight.

The morning shuttle runs south to the Namanga crossing for immigration formalities and continues to Arusha, arriving in the afternoon. Check in at your hotel.

West across the Maasai plains, past scattered acacia and traditional bomas, to Lake Manyara National Park. The game drive works through the groundwater forest at the foot of the escarpment, where hippo, elephant, buffalo, giraffe and blue monkey are all common. Dinner and overnight at the lodge or camp.

The road climbs over the Ngorongoro highlands, passing Maasai villages with wildlife grazing alongside the cattle, and drops into the Serengeti. Picnic lunch, then an afternoon game drive with good odds on lion, hippo, giraffe and elephant. Dinner and overnight at your camp or lodge.

A last morning on the plains before the drive east to the Ngorongoro Conservation Area, with lunch taken on the way. You arrive at the crater rim in the evening; the descent comes tomorrow. Dinner and overnight at your lodge.

The final game drive is inside the caldera itself, dropping around 600 metres from the rim to the floor. Open plains, acacia woodland and the central soda lake all sit within a few kilometres of each other, so sightings come quickly. Picnic lunch in the crater, then the climb out and the drive to Arusha, arriving in time to settle in for the evening.