Follow the wildebeest from the Maasai Mara into the Serengeti, then see Ngorongoro Crater and Tarangire.
Follow the Great Migration across two countries. Spend three nights in the Maasai Mara, where the herds cross the Mara River between July and October, then cross into Tanzania for four nights on the Serengeti plains, where the herds spend the rest of the year. The journey finishes with the Ngorongoro Crater and Tarangire's elephants.
You are met at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport by your Dawn Safaris representative and transferred to your hotel. Your guide gives a short briefing on the days ahead and answers any last-minute questions.
After breakfast, travel from Nairobi to Maasai Mara (about 5 to 6 hours), with a picnic lunch or lunch stop on the way. You arrive at your camp in time for lunch, then head out on your first game drive across the open plains of the Maasai Mara, home to lion, cheetah, elephant, buffalo and vast herds of zebra and wildebeest. Dinner and a night of lion calls follow.
Leave at first light with a packed breakfast to find big cats on the open plains. Enjoy a bush picnic lunch near the hippo pools, then spend the afternoon tracking lion, cheetah, elephant and buffalo before returning at dusk.
Drive toward the Mara River, where between July and October wildebeest herds gather to cross. Outside the migration season the banks are excellent for hippo, crocodile and elephant, and the surrounding plains for lion and cheetah.
After breakfast, travel from Maasai Mara to Serengeti (a long day by road via the Isebania/Sirari border post, or a short flight), with a picnic lunch or lunch stop on the way. You arrive in the Serengeti for lunch and a first afternoon game drive across endless plains. The park is home to lion, leopard, cheetah and huge herds of zebra and wildebeest, and the scale of the landscape is hard to describe.
Spend the day exploring the park's plains and river valleys with a picnic lunch in the bush. Seronera is known for lion, leopard and cheetah, and the migration herds can be tracked depending on the season.
Your guide uses the latest sightings to track the wildebeest and zebra herds, whose position shifts through the year: southern plains in the early months, western corridor around mid-year and northern Serengeti from July to October.
Explore the park's granite kopjes, favourite lookouts for lion and leopard, and finish with a sundowner as the sky turns orange.
After breakfast, travel from Serengeti to Ngorongoro (about 3 to 4 hours), with a picnic lunch or lunch stop on the way. You arrive on the crater rim in the Ngorongoro highlands, where the air is cool and the views drop into the world's largest intact volcanic caldera. The afternoon is free to enjoy the lodge or take a short rim walk.
After breakfast, travel from Ngorongoro to Tarangire (about 3 hours), with a picnic lunch or lunch stop on the way. You arrive at your camp in time for lunch, followed by a first game drive among Tarangire's baobab trees and elephant herds, with the river a magnet for wildlife in the dry season.
After breakfast, drive to Arusha (about 2 hours) for your onward flight, or take the shuttle back to Nairobi.
