17 DAYS SAFARI TOPI: KENYA / TANZANIA

DAY 1: NAIROBI
Arrive Nairobi. Welcome to Nairobi, Kenya's cosmopolitan capital. Once little more than a watering hole for Masai tribes, today's Nairobi is the largest city between Cairo and Johannesburg. If arrival is in the morning, then in the we drive to Karen Von Blixen's former home, now a museum. Continue to the Giraffe Center where you can feed and photograph giraffe from an elevated platform. Return to the hotel early this evening. ** Complimentary dinner at The Carnivore Restaurant. Nairobi has many restaurants offering a variety of exotic and African cuisine. However, none beats Carnivore for its uniqueness: It is for carnivorous. It is the only place you can get a variety of game Meat served in one meal. Its succulent steaks and barbecue dishes are recommended for every one especially as a welcome or a farewell Dinner/Lunch. Overnight at Panafric hotel or similar.

DAY 2: NAIROBI / MARA
Departure from Nairobi is early morning at 09.00 so as to arrive at the most popular game park in Kenya, the Mara (Masai Mara National Reserve) in time for lunch. Afternoon game drive. Abounding with wildlife, the Mara takes in a vast portion of the Serengeti. Lions are found here in large prides. Elephants, buffalos, zebras and hippos also are numerous. As this is a reserve rather than a national park, the Masai people are allowed to graze animals and to hunt within the reserve boundaries. All meals and overnight at Sopa lodge or similar.

DAY 3: MASAI MARA
Morning and afternoon game drive. This northern extension of the Serengeti is home to herds of plains game such as antelope, zebra, wildebeest and gazelle. The annual phenomenon of millions of wildebeests migrating en masse from the Serengeti in search of lush grass is a sight to behold. All meals and overnight at Sopa lodge or similar.

DAY 4: MARA / LAKE NAKURU
Lake Nakuru is also famous for its million or so flamingoes, both Lesser Flamingoes that feed on blue-green algae and diatoms that thrive in the warm, soda-rich water and Greater Flamingoes, which prefer crustaceans and insect larvae. Although the flamingo spectacle constitutes the most obvious wildlife, Lake Nakuru National Park boasts some 400 species of birds. It is a rhino sanctuary, one of the best places in Kenya to see both black and white rhino, as well as other large animals, including lion, leopard, and buffalo, which occupy the acacia savanna and grassland surrounding the lake. Meals and overnight at Lake Nakuru Lodge or Similar

DAY 5: NAKURU / NAIROBI / ARUSHA
Early breakfast the drive back to Nairobi. Board shuttle bus at 13.30hrs and then depart for Arusha at 14.00hrs to arrive at around 18.30hrs. Overnight at Impala hotel or similar.

DAY 6: ARUSHA / LAKE MANYARA
Noted for its five separate eco-zones and famous tree-climbing Lions, Lake Manyara National Park is also home to great herds of Cape Buffalo and African Elephant. Lake Manyara lies in a half graben against the steep western escarpment of the Manyara basin. We will visit a hot spring controlled by the master fault on the half graben. As usual birds are abundant, and make up a different assemblage than we have seen before. All meals and overnight at Lake Manyara Wildlife lodge.

DAY 7: LAKE MANYARA / SERENGETI
Pre-breakfast game drive. After breakfast drive to Serengeti national park. Afternoon game drive then drive back to the lodge for dinner and overnight. All meals and overnight at Seronera Wildlife lodge.

DAY 8: SERENGETI
Morning and afternoon game drive. This is Tanzania's most famous Game Park, covering 14763 sq. km, where wildebeest migrate across vast plains and landscape in search of precious grassland. Nowhere else on earth will you see wildebeest, zebra, and antelope in such enormous and mind boggling numbers. The gently rolling Savannah (flat grassland), with bushes and trees only in cluster along riverbanks makes spotting wildlife easy. Other animals seen are lion, hyena, Thomson's gazelle, impala, buffalo, topi, eland, giraffe, elephants, cheeter, rhino, and crocodiles on riverbanks. The hoofed animals are constantly on the move in search of grassland, and are watched and pursued by the predators, which feed off them. This is one of the most incredible sights you will see and the numbers are simply overwhelming. Also seen are the Masai tribes people grazing cattle in their age-old tradition. All meals and overnight at Seronera Wildlife lodge.

**Serengeti National Park is also the only Tanzanian Park where you can take HOT AIR BALOON flight similar to those available in Masai Mara in Kenya.

DAY 9: SERENGETI / NGORONGORO
Pre-breakfast game drive from 06.30hrs to 08.00hrs when you drive back to the lodge for breakfast. After breakfast drive to Ngorongoro Conservation area. Afternoon game drive then drive back to the Ngorongoro Wildlife lodge for dinner and overnight.

DAY 10: NGORONGORO
Visit what has been compared to the Garden of Eden-Ngorongoro Crater, an extinct collapsed volcano, rising to 7,500 feet at the outside rim with the floor being 2,000 feet below. This is all that remains of a once-vast volcano that is a part of the Great Rift Valley, the longest continuous crack in the earth's crust. Ngorongoro's floor extends 102 square miles with alkaline Lake Magadi in the center.
The crater is also an island sanctuary, protected from the fluctuating weather conditions on the surrounding savanna. Stay on the crater's rim for superb views from your quarters, where glass doors open to furnished verandas with breathtaking panoramas of Ngorongoro. The "big five" are here: lion, elephant, rhino, leopard and buffalo, plus many of the plains herbivores, such as wildebeest, Thomson's gazelle, zebra and reedbuck, along with thousands of flamingos. All meals and overnight at Ngorongoro wildlife lodge.

DAY 11: NGORONGORO / ARUSHA
Pre-breakfast game drive from 06.30hrs to 08.00hrs when you drive back to the lodge for breakfast. After breakfast drive to Arusha to arrive at noon. Overnight at Impala hotel or similar.

DAY 12: ARUSHA / NAMANGA / AMBOSELI
Board shuttle bus at 07.30hrs. Depart from Arusha at 08.00hrs to arrive at Namanga border town at around 10.30hrs. You will then board safari vans at Namanga and proceed to Amboseli lodge to arrive in time for lunch. Afternoon game drive from 16.00hrs to 18.30hrs when you drive back to the lodge for dinner and overnight. All meals and overnight at Amboseli lodge or similar.

DAY 13: AMBOSELI
Morning and afternoon game drive. All meals and overnight at Amboseli lodge or similar.