Try a Luxury Safari in Tanzania
What’s on Your Bucket List ? What About a Luxury Safari in Tanzania ?
If you have ever been on an animal safari in Africa, you probably ” caught the bug “. After our strenuous summit of Kilimanjaro, we decided to enjoy a little luxury and enjoy the nature and wildlife in Tanzania.
I have been on a number of safaris in Africa, but this was a whole new level. My cousin heads up an exclusive chain of Lodges in Eastern Africa called &Beyond, and not only were their properties uniquely located, but the service and guides were exceptional.
Lake Manyara is a small National Park in the Great Rift Valley, but every day was an adventure as we went out on game drives searching for animals. This is one of the few places where you can spot the “Tree Climbing Lions”, and we saw a family of them just lounging in tree branches.
One day we decided to go looking for elephants, and our guide took us up a small trail and I thought I spotted one in the bushes.
Max was sure I was imagining things, but our guide suggested we stop and just wait quietly for a few minutes, and we had a close encounter with a herd of over 100 elephants thundering down and across the trail on both sides of our jeep – we had to keep our hands, feet and cameras inside the open jeep to not get hit, but it was a magical moment.
We also came across troupes of hundreds of baboons and it was fascinating to watch them playing, fighting, cleaning each other, and nurturing their babies.
The lodge operated by &Beyond was unique in that it was deep inside theLake Manyara National Park, so not only did we have the advantage of being able to go out and enjoy hot breakfasts in front of the hippo pool before the park even opened, and avoid the crowds of “day tourists” coming in from other lodges, but also stay after the park closed and enjoy SunDowners while watching spectacular sunsets, without another soul in sight.
Our elegant treehouse suite boasted a living room, two bedrooms with ensuites, including a claw foot cast iron tub for bubble baths, as well as indoor and outdoor showers, and was set on stilts in a mahogany fore st with a wrap around balcony.
The service and staff was unparalelled – every time we arrived back, our butler was waiting with cool faceclothes and some kind of exotic freshly squeezed juice. The 4 course meals were served outside in a forest boma, where you often see elephants trotting through the dining area, and of cou rse, the Tanzanians love singing and dancing, and the entire staff participated at night.
The &Beyond Lodge on top of the rim of the Ngor ongoro Crater was off the chain ! It was an eclectic combination of old European antiques and rustic Maasai culture.
Every morning we braved the torturous winding road down into the crater with the jeep in low 4 wheel drive to see what we could discover. Coming back to the lodge we were treated like royalty, with aperatifs by the fireplace, personalized menus for each of us based on our food preferences, and then discovering they had a hot bubble bath with rose petals artistically spread in the bathroom waiting for us when we headed back to our room.
We ate lunch by one of the hippo pools, being careful not to get too close – the hippopotamus is one of the most dangerous animals in Africa – they look fat and lazy, but they can run faster than we can and they could bite someone our size right in half with their enormous teeth and strong jaws.
I have never seen such “Lazy Lions” as we did in Ngorongoro – we were watching a pride of about 13 lying in the shade by a river and saw a herd of wildebeest coming across the crater with one obviously injured wildebeest limping, unable to use one of his legs. We thought he was dinner for sure ! But those lazy lions just watched as the wounded wildebeest limped past them, only 20 feet away. Our guide told us that their Lazy Lions often wait for the hyenas to do the tough work of chasing down and killing the prey, and then they move in and take over and have dinner.
The Ngorongoro Crater is often called Africa’s Garden of Eden and was created when a huge volcano exploded and collapsed in on itself, and is the largest volcanic caldera in the world that has not been flooded or broken, completely surrounded by 2000 foot walls. The 20 km caldera is home to over 25,000 large animals, so there is never a dull moment.
Once you get in “safari mode”, it is an adventure every game drive…you might not see what you were hoping to see that day – we were teasing our guide and “requesting specific animal sightings” on the way out in the morning, but its not a zoo – it is nature, and you don’t always see what you set out to look for, but there’s something new, something different every day.
It gets addictive !
Watch Max & Oksana’s video footage:
Start travelling ~ either gather some friends to go with you so you can go for free, refer enough Vortex Free Customers to earn a free trip, or, if you have the money, just book it at the Surge365 discounted membership rate ~ but go out and Experience someplace new!
“The World is a Book and those people who do not travel read only one page.” -St Augustine
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