Safari Information
We arrange custom safaris and help our clients build a safari
trip that they enjoy. There are several options: a lodging safari,
camping safari, day trip safari, and one or multiple nights safaris.
The Serengeti National Park is one of the most famous safari
destinations in the world and we highly recommend a trip to this park.
Clients enjoy seeing the “Big 5″ including lions, leopards, elephants, water
buffalo and rhinoceros. Rhinos are most commonly seen in the Ngorongoro crater
which has one of the highest concentrations of rhinos anywhere in the
world. We specialize in finding these animals for our clients. The
real joy comes in finding many of the other animals as well, such as cheetah,
topi, gazelle, giraffe, waterbuck, eland, dik dik, fox, baboon, and many many
more. Check out our “Photo Gallery” for some photos that former clients
have posted.
Mwanza and Arusha are the two most popular places to start a
safari to the Serengeti. We most
commonly start from Mwanza and Arusha as well.
The most popular trip is to start in Mwanza, and then drive
through the western corridor of the Serengeti. Here the landscape is acacia
woodland and it is common to see giraffe, elephants, zebra, impala, topi,
ostrich, hipo, waterbuck and many smaller animals. Then we drive to the
central Serengeti which is a large plain and full to tall grass. Here we
can find the big cats such as lion, leopards and cheetah if it is a good day
since they do move to find their food. From June to August is the right
time to see the wildebeest migration. From the central Serengeti, we
drive south to the Ngorongoro Crater which has an amazing density of wildlife
including the endangered black rhinoceros. We then head back to spend
more time in the central Serengeti and then back to Mwanza. This trip
takes at least 2 nights and 3 days, but many clients take longer so they have
more time to enjoy the park.
SERENGETI NATIONAL PARK
The first Briton to enter the Serengeti, Stewart Edward White, recorded his explorations in the northern Serengeti in 1913. Stewart returned to the Serengeti in the 1920s and camped in the area around Seronera for three months. During this time, he and his companions shot 50 lions.[6]
Because the hunting of lions made them scarce, the British colonial administration made a partial game reserve of 800 acres (3.2 km2) in the area in 1921 and a full one in 1929. These actions were the basis for Serengeti National Park,[5] which was established in 1951.
The Serengeti gained more fame after the initial work of Bernhard Grzimek and his son Michael in the 1950s. Together, they produced the book and film Serengeti Shall Not Die, widely recognized as one of the most important early pieces of nature conservation documentary.[citation needed]
To preserve wildlife, the British evicted the resident Maasai from the park in 1959 and moved them to the Ngorongoro Conservation Area. There is still considerable controversy surrounding this move, with claims made of coercion and deceit on the part of the colonial authorities.[5]
The park is Tanzania's oldest national park and remains the flagship of the country's tourism industry, providing a major draw to the Northern Safari Circuit encompassing Lake Manyara National Park, Tarangire National Park, Arusha National Park, and the Ngorongoro Conservation Area.
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The Serengeti National Park is a Tanzanian national
park in the Serengeti ecosystem in the Mara
and Simiyu
regions.[2][3]
It is famous for its annual migration of over 1.5 million white bearded (or
brindled) wildebeest
and 250,000 zebra
and for its numerous Nile crocodile.
The Maasai people had been grazing their livestock in the
open plains of eastern Mara Region, which they named "endless
plains", for around 200 years when the first European explorer, German Oscar
Baumann, visited the area in 1892.[4]
The name "Serengeti" is an approximation of the word used by the
Maasai to describe the area, siringet, which means "the place where
the land runs on forever."[5]The first Briton to enter the Serengeti, Stewart Edward White, recorded his explorations in the northern Serengeti in 1913. Stewart returned to the Serengeti in the 1920s and camped in the area around Seronera for three months. During this time, he and his companions shot 50 lions.[6]
Because the hunting of lions made them scarce, the British colonial administration made a partial game reserve of 800 acres (3.2 km2) in the area in 1921 and a full one in 1929. These actions were the basis for Serengeti National Park,[5] which was established in 1951.
The Serengeti gained more fame after the initial work of Bernhard Grzimek and his son Michael in the 1950s. Together, they produced the book and film Serengeti Shall Not Die, widely recognized as one of the most important early pieces of nature conservation documentary.[citation needed]
To preserve wildlife, the British evicted the resident Maasai from the park in 1959 and moved them to the Ngorongoro Conservation Area. There is still considerable controversy surrounding this move, with claims made of coercion and deceit on the part of the colonial authorities.[5]
The park is Tanzania's oldest national park and remains the flagship of the country's tourism industry, providing a major draw to the Northern Safari Circuit encompassing Lake Manyara National Park, Tarangire National Park, Arusha National Park, and the Ngorongoro Conservation Area.
View Larger Map
Great
migration
Migrating wildebeests
Wildebeests crossing the river
during the Serengeti migration
Each year around the same time the
circular great wildebeest migration begins in the Ngorongoro area of the southern Serengeti of
Tanzania. This migration is a natural phenomenon determined by the availability
of grazing. This phase lasts from approximately January to March, when the
calving season begins – a time when there is plenty of rain ripened grass
available for the 260,000 zebra that precede 1.7 million wildebeest and the
following hundreds of thousands of other plains game including around 470
thousand gazelles.[10][11][12]
During February the wildebeest spend
their time on the short grass plains of the south eastern part of the
ecosystem, grazing and giving birth to approximately 500,000 calves within a 2
to 3-week period: a remarkably synchronised event. Few calves are born ahead of
time and of these, hardly any survive. The main reason for this is that very
young calves are more noticeable to predators when mixed with older calves from
the previous year, and so are easier prey. As the rains end in May the animals
start moving north west, into the areas around the Grumeti River,
where they typically remain until late June. The crossings of the Grumeti and Mara rivers is a popular safari attraction.[10] July sees the main migration of
wildebeest, zebra and eland heading north, arriving on the Kenyan border late
July / August for the remainder of the dry season (the Thomson's and Grant's Gazelles move only east/west). In early
November with the start of the short rains the migration starts moving south
again, to the short grass plains of the south east, usually arriving in
December in plenty of time for calving in February.[13]
Some 250,000 wildebeest die during
the journey from Tanzania to Maasai Mara Reserve in lower Kenya,
a total of 800 kilometres (500 mi). Death is usually from thirst, hunger,
exhaustion, or predation.[2] The migration is chronicled in the 1994
documentary film, Africa: The Serengeti.
The second-largest is the South Sudan animal migration.
We can arrange custom safari depending on what
the client wants. Just email us what you are looking for and we can
design a safari together!
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