Amboseli, Tarangire, the Serengeti, Ngorongoro and Lake Manyara by 4x4 on a small-group camping safari.
A long overland adventure in a small group, camping across Kenya and Tanzania. Start with Amboseli beneath Kilimanjaro, cross the border at Namanga, then camp in Tarangire, the Serengeti, Ngorongoro and Lake Manyara. You travel in a 4x4 safari vehicle with a guide and camp crew, with four nights in the Serengeti to explore its plains in depth.
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 Amboseli (about 4 to 5 hours), with a picnic lunch or lunch stop on the way. You arrive at your lodge in time for lunch. An afternoon game drive across the open plains brings you close to Amboseli's famous elephant herds, with Mount Kilimanjaro rising behind them when the clouds lift.
Spend the day with some of Africa's best-studied elephant herds. Early light is the best time to see Kilimanjaro, and the swamps around Enkongo Narok draw hippo, buffalo and abundant birdlife.
After breakfast, travel from Amboseli to Arusha (about 4 to 5 hours, including the Namanga border crossing), with a picnic lunch or lunch stop on the way. You arrive in Arusha after clearing the border and check in to your hotel to freshen up. A short briefing covers the Tanzanian leg of your journey.
After breakfast, travel from Arusha to Tarangire (about 2 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, travel from Tarangire to Serengeti (a long but scenic day of 7 to 8 hours through the Ngorongoro highlands), 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 Lake Manyara (about 1.5 hours), with a picnic lunch or lunch stop on the way. You arrive at your lodge near the escarpment for lunch, then enjoy a game drive through the groundwater forest, with baboons, elephants and hippos and a chance of the park's tree-climbing lions.
After breakfast, travel from Lake Manyara to Arusha (about 1.5 to 2 hours), with a picnic lunch or lunch stop on the way. You arrive in Arusha after clearing the border and check in to your hotel to freshen up. A short briefing covers the Tanzanian leg of your journey.
After breakfast, you are transferred to Arusha or Kilimanjaro airport for your onward flight, or board a shuttle back to Nairobi.
