10-Day Tanzania Green Season Safari

Your guide meets you at Kilimanjaro International Airport and drives you to your hotel in Arusha. Nothing else is planned today, which is deliberate after a long flight. Settle in at The African Tulip Hotel, rest, and sort out your bags and camera gear for the days ahead. Dinner is included tonight. Send us your flight details when you book so the airport pickup is timed to your arrival. Tomorrow starts after breakfast with the drive to Lake Manyara, so an early night isn't a bad idea.

After breakfast you drive to Lake Manyara National Park for your first game drive. The park is small, but it holds a lot: elephants, baboons and the tree-climbing lions it's known for, though the lions are never a sure thing. In the Green Season the vegetation is thick and fresh and the animals are active. Lunch is a picnic in the park. Later you continue to Karatu for dinner and the night at Country Lodge Karatu. Breakfast, lunch and dinner are all included.

Today you leave the parks behind and travel to Lake Eyasi to spend time with the local Datoga people and the Hadzabe, one of Africa's last hunter-gatherer communities. The main event is a hunting excursion with Hadzabe hunters. You go out with them on foot and learn the survival skills their way of life depends on. Wear closed shoes for the walk. It's a different pace from a game drive, and a chance to see how people have lived off this land. Tonight is the first of two nights at Lake Eyasi Safari Lodge, with all meals included.

A second, slower day at Lake Eyasi. The main outing is after lunch, when you head out around the lake to see how people here farm and fish, and to learn about the alkaline lake and the country around it. You get a closer look at the everyday side of life in the region, away from the vehicles and the parks. It's a useful pause before the long game-drive days that start tomorrow in the Southern Serengeti. Breakfast, lunch and dinner are included, and you spend a second night at Lake Eyasi Safari Lodge.

Today you drive to the southern Serengeti plains, where the migration herds gather in the Green Season to give birth. Once you arrive, you start exploring the calving grounds with your guide: wildebeest with newborn calves taking their first steps, and the predators watching the herds closely. The southern plains are rich in predators at this time of year, so game viewing can be busy and sometimes tense as the newborns face their first challenges. All meals are included. This is the first of three nights in the Southern Serengeti; ask our team which camp we use for these nights.

A full day out on the plains with the herds. During calving, wildebeest, zebras and gazelles have their young across the southern Serengeti, and the herds can run into the thousands. All those vulnerable newborns draw predators, so your guide splits the day between the herds and the hunters following them. Where you drive depends on where the herds are that week. Your guide reads their movement and plans around it, which is why the day stays flexible. Breakfast, lunch and dinner are included, with the night at your Southern Serengeti camp.

One more full day in the south, with game drives across the green plains. By now you'll have a feel for the rhythm of the herds, so the day can follow whatever is happening: a predator you want to stay with longer, or simply the open Serengeti in Green Season colour. You return to camp to rest between drives. The Green Season light is good for photography, so keep spare batteries and memory cards with you. All meals are included, and it's your last night in the Southern Serengeti.

Start with a last morning game drive on the Serengeti plains, then head for the Ngorongoro Highlands. The change is easy to see as you climb: open grassland gives way to highland forest and the air turns cooler. Keep a warm fleece handy for the evening. You arrive at Ngorongoro Kuhama Camp for the first of two nights, with breakfast, lunch and dinner included. The crater is tomorrow, so the evening is a chance to rest after the Serengeti days.

Today you descend into Ngorongoro Crater for a full day of game drives on the crater floor. The crater is a UNESCO World Heritage site with one of the highest concentrations of wildlife in Africa, and all of the Big Five can be seen here, though no single sighting is ever certain. The crater descent fee is included in your safari. After a long day inside, you drive back up to Ngorongoro Kuhama Camp for your last night on safari, with all meals included.

After breakfast you leave the highlands and drive back to Arusha. Lunch is in town, and there's time for some last-minute shopping before your transfer to the airport for your flight home. Because the morning is spent on the road from Ngorongoro, an afternoon or evening international departure works best. Tell us your flight times and we'll plan the day around them. Breakfast and lunch are included today, and no accommodation is booked for tonight.