After breakfast, you will drive to the Ngorongoro Crater for game viewing and a picnic lunch. This park is one of the most densely crowded wildlife areas in the world and is home to an estimated 30,000 animals. The crater is often called “Africa’s Eden” and is also considered the eighth Natural Wonder of the World. A visit to this amazing place is the main draw for tourists coming to Tanzania and undoubtedly a world-class attraction! Within the crater rim, large herds of zebra and wildebeest graze while lions sleep and laze in the sun nearby. At dawn, the endangered black rhino will return to the thick cover of the crater forests, after grazing on the dew-laden grass in the morning mist. Just outside the crater’s ridge, tall Maasai herd their cattle and goats over green pasture and through highland slopes. They live alongside the wildlife here as they have done for centuries.

Main destinations: Tarangire NP

Accommodations: Mvuli Lodge

Lake Manyara National Park is dominated by a shallow alkaline lake at the base of the Rift Valley escarpment. It is famous for its tree-climbing lions and large elephant herds. The park entrance leads to a junglelike groundwater forest, which is home to big numbers of olive baboon and blue monkey. A thrilling 370m-/1,200ft-long treetop walkway offers a bird’s-eye view into this unique habitat.

Due to Lake Manyara’s high water level in recent years, there isn’t a game-drive track following the shore anymore. This has unfortunately changed the quality of wildlife viewing and birding considerably. However, four of the  

Big Five are present (rhino is absent). Animals easily seen include buffalo, elephant, giraffe, zebra and wildebeest. Look out for solitary bushbuck creeping around in the forest undergrowth and pairs of klipspringer balancing on rocks near the hot springs (Maji Moto).

• Main destinations: JRO AIRPORT