Tanzania Safari

August-September, 2013

City of Arusha       Tarangire Park       Ngorongoro Crater

Olduvai      Serengeti Mara       Katavi Park       Mahale Park

Our Africa

Being at the top of our bucket list, a trip to Africa for a safari had been something that we wanted to do since we were kids watching the National Geographic specials on television. Back then, however, it seemed a million miles away, and out of reach financially. Fast forward fifty years, and a lot has changed.

Starting from a discussion on Saturday morning at our favourite breakfast spot, to planning the safari with our travelling companions, the process took about a year. It was a daunting task to try and figure out what to do, and where to go. But buying a guide book to Kenya gave us a name of a safari organizer in England that specialized in custom made safaris. A call to them was all that was needed. They organized an 18 day safari in Tanzania that was half the price of the big name outfitters like Abercrombie and Kent, Ker & Downey or Micado Tours.

Africa Travel Resource recommended that we go to a single country for our first safari, and that country should be Tanzania. It has a well developed safari industry, is tourist friendly and politically stable. It also has a wide diversity of abundant wildlife.

Tanzania also has one of the most impressive events in the natural world, the massive wildebeest and zebra migration that sees almost a million animals cross the Mara River in search of greener pastures. It's something that we all felt strongly about seeing. All we had to do was time our visit around the migration, but because this migration is driven largely by available grazing, its timing is widely affected by the weather. It was a matter of looking at the statistics, and then booking an itinerary that put us in the right place at the most opportune time.

With the itinerary finalized, and the flights booked, we only had to wait for ten months to go by in order to start the adventure. The months passed quickly while our camps waited patiently for our arrival.