Our Long Journey in Tanzania March 2013

New York To Arusha, Tanzania
Our trip to Tanzania took 24 hours to get from Newark NJ to Dar Es Salaam and this included an eight hour layover at London Heathrow(we got a small room at the Terminal 4 Yotel). Once in Dar Es Salaam we were met by representatives of Coastal Airlines even before we passed immigration and once we passed immigration, we were transferred to the other side of the airport, the regional section and awaited our bush plane to Arusha. It had been a good idea to get our visas prior to arrival, as the lines to get visas were getting long. Our 12 seat plane unknown to us was scheduled to make 4 stops before finally arriving at Arusha. We first landed in Zanzibar on a nice smooth airstrip, then 2 dirt strips on the mainland coast north of Zanzibar and then to a rough paved air strip in Moshi and finally we landed in Arusha. The lodge was not far from the local airstrip and we got to see some of the city, the fourth largest in Tanzania.

Departure from Dar Es Salaam via 12 seater and 4 hops

Asusha
In Arusha we stayed at Moivaro Coffee lodge and visited the Shanga Project on our second day.

Once arriving in Arusha we travel overland, on the first day of our Safari we left the lodge at 9:00 and arrived at Tarangire NP at 12:45.  We had stopped at the Cultural Heritage Center in Arusha on our way to Tarangire, if we had stopped here last, I think we would have purchased a lot more crafts. They had very nice quality items at good prices. An hour out of Arusha we ran into a diversion or what we call a "detour". The road was being regraded and repaved, but they were starting in the middle as opposed to starting in Arusha or one of the other large settlement on the route. The diversion was very rough, otherwise the road to Tarangire NP was very scenic and pleasant.

Our route from Arusha to the Serengeti

Views on the road towards Tarangire NP

Some settlements on the way to Tarangire NP

Tarangire NP
Once in the park we saw Impala, warthogs, giraffe, zebra, lions and elephants all within an hour. The terrain in this park was what I had expected all of Tanzania to be like, not very educated, but there you go. The 2 days we visited Tarangire NP we stayed nearby at the Maramboi Tented Camp.

Tarangire NP

View from picnic area famous for Monkey Attacks

Additional Tarangire views

Crossing Tarangire River in the NP

Tarangire River

Our Great Adventure to Lake Manyara National Park
Our guide had learned from another driver with whom he worked that it was now permissible to enter Lake Manyara NP via the south gate. This would allow us to visit the park without backtracking. He asked us if we minded a bit of an adventure and we were all in. He said he had an idea of the route to get us there, but not to worry if he inquired from time to time along the way. 

Fording a river

We left Maramboi at 8:30 AM and along the route we saw rice patties(something else I didn't expect), an abandoned building from either German or English Colonial times, bricks in different phases of manufacture and some charcoal being made. We also saw and heard lots of little kids that would come running out of their homes yelling "Bye", they were so excited to see us. Ammy our driver said "bye" was the most english that their teacher had taught them. We arrived at the Lake Manyare NP South Gate at 10:15 AM.

Bricks ready for Firing, as seen on the way to Lake Manyara NP South Gate

Cliffs of the Rift Valley Escarpment at the South end of the Lake Manyara NP

Lake Manyara NP
We were only here for the day(10:15 AM to 2:30 PM) and that was plenty, especially since Tarangire had already fulfilled most of our wildlife viewing expectations. We hadn't seen any leopards yet and were hoping to see some in the trees of Lake Manyara NP as well as some lions. We ended up not seeing any leopards, but did see hippos, more giraffes, elephants, lions(not in trees), antelopes and some blue monkeys.

Cliffs closer up

We left the park at 2:30 PM and arrived at the Ngorongoro Gate at 3:55 PM. Along the way we stopped and purchased some souvenirs at better prices than the lodge gift shops at the Shirt Shack (right hand side while driving towards Karatu). We briefly stopped at the Karatu market at 3:40 PM, it was crowded, but looked as if there was a lot more room for vendors.

On the top of the Rift Escarpment just after leaving Lake Manyara NP, we stopped for diesel, pumped by a lady which Ammy said was not uncommon

Market in Karatu midway between Lake Manyara NP and the Ngorongoro Lodoare Gate

Ngorongoro Gate, the road now changes from paved to dirt.

From the gate it was about an hour to the Ngorongoro Serena Lodge on rough dirt roads and some were very twisty with steep drop offs. When we stopped at the overlook of the crater, our guide told us to close our eyes and then told us when to look and the view was amazing. I had never seen such a huge hole in the ground. We spent one day on the floor of the crater, our lodge was the closest to the descent gate and it was only 10 minutes to the gate and then 15 minutes to the floor. We spent the day from 8 AM to 2:15 PM in the crater. New animals we saw in the crater were black rhinos, kori bustards and an eland. Normally the ascent road is open, but it was being repaired and we had to take a longer route back to our lodge.

The descent road to Ngorongoro crater bottom with morning mists obscuring the view

Ngorongoro Conservation Area
After the crater we spent 2 days in the Ngorongoro Conservation Area (NCA) and we stayed at Olakira Mobile tented camp. We left for Olakira camp at 8 AM and we stopped at the Oldupai gorge museum for an hour, it took about an hour from the Ngorongoro Serena Lodge and the visit was worth the trip. I would have liked to visit the shifting sands and also seen more of the gorge. We spend the rest of the day game viewing and arrived at Olakira camp around 3 PM. On our second day we split the day going out early in the morning, 6:15AM taking our breakfast and again later in the afternoon at 4 PM. The vistas in the conservation area seemed to go on forever. Sometimes there were wildebeest and zebra as far as the eye could see and sometimes you were all alone.

Vast vistas in the NCA

Serengeti 
We left Olakira Camp for the Serengeti at 8 AM and did some game viewing along the way, the highlight being giraffe and zebra on vacation at Lake Ndutu. We arrived at the Serengeti Naabi Hill gate at 11:50 AM. After having a box lunch at Naabi Hill we started our drive through the Serengeti. We arrived at the Mbuzi Mawe tented camp at 4 PM. On our second day in the Serengeti we went out twice, once at 7:30 AM and again at 4 PM. New animals we saw in the Serengeti were the Topi, Defassa Waterbuck, dwarf mongoose and finally some Leopard.

Gate at Naabi Hill

We had arrived at this gate 2 days prior, but then drove south to the Lake Ndutu area of the Ngorongoro Conservation Area

Simba Kopjes(granite outcrops) about 25 minutes north of the Naabi Hill Gate

Kopjes seen from our tented camp north of Seronera area

Different terrain seen in the Central and Northern Serengeti

Whistling Acacias

Some Kopjes we saw at the furthest point north we went in the Serengeti, maybe the Lobo Kopjes

On our last day, we left the camp at 9AM and arrived at the Seronera airstrip at 10 AM for a 10:30 AM flight. Our plane was a bit late and after awhile we were off flying over the Serengeti, the highlight was flying over the Ngorongoro Crater. We landed at Kilimanjaro Airport(after a short stop at Lake Manyara dirtstrip) and transferred to another plane for the flight to Wilson Regional airstrip in Nairobi, Kenya arriving at 3:15 PM. We transferred to Ole Serena Hotel and left later at 8:30 PM for our 11:30 PM flight to LHR.

Land Rovers in the Wild

On our visit to Tanzania I was surprised to find that there were Palm trees and that the landscape was more than just savannah and acacia trees. The company that we booked our safari through used Land Cruisers as did most of the other companies we had sent requests to. I knew that there would not be a lot of Land Rovers, but was also surprised at how few there were. In any case, we did see some Discoverys, Range Rovers, some older 1980s models and some very new ones. We also saw Defenders, and Series I, II and III. I saw more Rovers than the photos below, but some photos I didn't take because there were people around the vehicles and I didn't want them to think I was taking photos of them. On our brief stay in Nairobi there seemed to be markedly more Rovers, I saw 3 Series tow trucks just on the way to the hotel which was only about a 10 minute drive.

Not a Land Rover, but our home for the trip. 2 roof hatches, seats for 4 passengers, a cool box and as much bottled water as you could force down. Very smooth ride even on washboard roads doing 60kph.

The six cylinder NA diesel engine was very clean, of course I had Ammy our guide open the hood.

These 2 Rovers were in the Ngorongoro Crater

And here are some of the others on Safari in the crater with us. This is a picnic and rest area. There were a few hippos in the lake, but not much else of interest at this spot.

There are more out of the shot and only 2 Land Rovers.

These 2 were seen on our way back to the Serena Ngorongoro Lodge near the Ngorongoro Staff quarters.

The next 4 were seen in the Serengeti National Park.

The Frankfurt Zoological Society has a Regional Office in the Serengeti and has many active nature conservation projects in East Africa. You can donate here.

Tanzania Lodging

Arusha
We spent 2 nights at the Moivaro Lodge. Reminded me very much of the Caribbean, between the flowers and the building styles. The lodge had a pool and we had the best food here. It was a good idea to spend the extra day getting used to the time changes and the climate, we started our Safari very relaxed. We had no hitches on the way out, but if we did the extra day could have prevented a catastrophe.

Lake Manyara
The Maramboi Tented Lodge was on the southeastern shore of Lake Manyara.
Breakfast and dinner was buffet, not our favorite type of meal. First night the Camp's water line had an issue and we were without water till we got back from our game drive the next afternoon. We had one night of heavy wind and rain and a second night of just heavy wind. On occasion you could smell the lake which was an alkaline lake. From our porch we watched warthogs, zebra, wildebeests, jackals and all sorts of birds.

Our tent was named "Mbuni"or Ostrich and was at the end of the line.

 

The view from the porch towards Lake Manyara and the Rift Valley Escarpment.

The buildings reminded me of Gilligan's Island

Some of the 30 tents, they were building more while we were there.

Guard tower

Ngorongoro Crater (actually a caldera), 12 miles across.
Nights 5 and 6 we spent at Ngorongoro Serena Lodge on the rim of the Crater, closest to the descent road. While we were there the ascent road was being worked on and we had to exit via the Lemala Ascent and descent road on the North Eastern side of the crater, this made the return trip to the lodge quite a bit longer.
The food at the Ngorongoro Serena lodge was just OK, but they served the best boxed lunches we had on our trip, they contained Cadbury chocolate, one day we had a chicken leg, the next some good meat(though we disagreed about what kind of meat it was). All the boxed lunches and breakfasts on the whole trip were very generous and we rarely finished them. This lodge held the most guests of all the lodges we stayed at on our trip.

You could see the lodge from the crater bottom, but it blended in fairly well.

This view towards the dining room and bar.

Animal protection moat, really.

View of the crater.

Southern Serengti and the Ngorongoro Conservation Area
Olakira mobile tented camp was by far the most rustic place we stayed at, but was our favorite. The staff everywhere were very good, but at Olakira they were excellent. We visited the bush kitchen which was larger than we expected. The porch was 9 feet long, the bedroom area was 15 feet long and the bathroom was 10 foot. We had some rain the second night and everyone was issued wellies. The mud was very slippery and it was quite enjoyable watching the different ways people got in and out of their wellies at the dining tent. Both nights we had a fire and Sundowners (drinks by the fire).

Serengeti, North of Seronara
The last 2 nights we stayed at Mbuzi Mawe another Serena lodge, located amongst the Pombofu Kopjes. Escorts were required after dark, mainly due to the presence of the very unpredictable African buffalo. Food was good here and we saw Klipspringers (small antelope who are nimble, surefooted and climb rocks real well), hyrax, buffalo, baboons and lots of lizards at the camp.

 

View from our porch