East Africa Family Safari Southbound

Jambo! Welcome to Kenya.

Your adventure begins with a welcome meeting at 10am on Day 1.

You can arrive at any time as there are no activities planned until this important meeting; please ask the hotel reception where it will take place. If you can't arrange a flight that will arrive in time, you may wish to arrive a day early so you're able to attend. We'll be happy to book additional accommodation for you (subject to availability). If you're going to be late, please inform the hotel reception. We'll be collecting your insurance details and next of kin information at this meeting so please ensure you have all these details to provide to your leader.

Nairobi - which takes its name from a Maasai phrase meaning 'place of cool waters' - has a cosmopolitan atmosphere. There are plenty of good bars and restaurants, while markets and shops have most things you could want or need, as well as various arts and crafts from the region.

If you arrive early, you can head out and explore the National Museum of Kenya, the Karen Blixen Museum (author of Out of Africa) or Bomas of Kenya where traditional homesteads of several Kenyan tribes are displayed in an outdoor village.

Visit the Langata Giraffe Sanctuary where you can feed, and perhaps even kiss, a giraffe. Stay in a simple hotel with swimming pool, restaurant and en suite bathrooms.

Included Activities

Langata Giraffe Sanctuary

Optional Activities

National Museum, Nairobi - USD14.00

Karen Blixen museum, Nairobi - USD14.00

Bomas, Nairobi - USD10.00

Nairobi National Park safari walk, Nairobi - USD20.00

Accommodation

Hotel (1 nt)

Set off early, heading for the border with Tanzania. Spend some time in Arusha, the safari capital of Tanzania, before heading to our campsite in the village of Mto Wa Mbu (400 km, approx 8-10 hrs).

Situated at the base of Mt Meru, Arusha is the safari capital of Tanzania and there's plenty to see and do. There are lots of good bars and restaurants. Markets and shops have most things you could want or need alongside various arts and crafts from the region.

Along the way we'll see the brightly attired Maasai herding their cattle. This is probably the most famous of all the African tribes, for the Maasai are a pastoral people renowned for drinking cattle blood mixed with milk, a mainstay of their diet. Tall and slender, they carry themselves elegantly, and are dressed in brilliant red cloth, with both men and women adorned with beadwork and metal jewellery.

A small village community, Mto Wa Mbu offers an excellent way to get a close-up look at life in an African town away from the main tourist trail.

Stay at a campsite with flush toilets and hot/cold showers.

Accommodation

Camping (with facilities) (1 nt)

Join the local community with a guided stroll around the farming areas - including visits to a kindergarten, milling machine, local homes and farmlands. This is a great way to have fun and find out more about the life of the locals. You'll also have the chance to look around the town and visit the local market. You may wish to indulge in a spot of shopping - wood carvings and local artworks are the specialities of this area.

Take a short drive from Mto Wa Mbu to Karatu.

Stay at a campsite with flush toilets and showers.

Included Activities

Village walk; market

Accommodation

Camping (with facilities) (1 nt)

Rise early and leave the truck behind, putting our camping and personal gear into six-person jeeps and heading out for our excursion into the Serengeti.

The wide, open plains of the Serengeti - green after the rains, brown and burnt in the dry season, and home to thousands of hoofed animals and fierce predators - are perhaps the quintessential image of Africa. Flat and rolling with long grasses and dotted with acacia trees, the plains get their name from the Maasai word Siringitu - 'the place where the land moves on forever'.

Game viewing in the Serengeti is amazing and as you camp out at night, don't be surprised to hear lions in the distance as you recount your wildlife sightings from the day. In normal circumstances, we would expect to see the Big Five during our stay in the Serengeti.

For an unforgettable experience, you might like to do an optional sunrise balloon ride over the Serengeti. If you have pre-booked this activity (please see 'Important Notes'), you'll be picked up and driven to the launch site where you receive a safety briefing from your pilot and help inflate the balloon. You'll then float over the Serengeti as the sun comes up gaining an overview of the immensity of the Serengeti, seeing the abundance of wildlife in their early morning activity and sometimes descending to tree height for amazing wildlife photography opportunities. Upon landing, you'll be treated to a five-star bush breakfast before being returned to your accommodation.

Our campsite is within the Serengeti itself so listen out for the sounds of nocturnal animals as you drift off to sleep. The bush camp is quite basic with drop toilets and cold showers. You'll notice many Maasai villages in the region of the Serengeti and Ngorongoro Crater. While it's of course fascinating to visit different cultures, past experience has shown that these villages exist primarily as tourism businesses offering somewhat contrived performances of their traditional ways. You'll be charged an entry fee of approx US$20 and the Maasai will try very hard to sell souvenirs to you. While many clients still enjoy the experience, others have found it artificial and uncomfortable. We recommend our travelers bypass this activity as our Kenyan colleagues observe that it negatively impacts the Maasai culture and travellers' perception of this culture.

Included Activities

Game drive

Optional Activities

Balloon ride, Serengeti National Park - USD500.00

Accommodation

Camping (with basic facilities) (2 nts)

Rise with the sun as we make an early start, exiting the Serengeti and heading for the world-famous Ngorongoro Crater (approx 3 hrs drive). After a picnic lunch, we descend onto the floor of the crater.

A huge, perfectly intact volcanic crater, Ngorongoro is home to some 30,000 animals including endangered black rhinos, lions, leopards, elephants, impalas, zebras and hippos. The crater floor offers excellent game viewing all year round and the photographic opportunities here are unrivaled.

Departing the crater late in the afternoon, drive to our campsite at Karatu for an evening relaxing and reliving our safari experience.

Included Activities

Game drive

Accommodation

Camping (with facilities) (1 nt)

Make an early start on our journey back through Arusha and on to Moshi before arriving in Marangu on slopes of Kilimanjaro (200 km, approx 5 hrs).

Meet the very special kids of the Amani Children's Home in Moshi. Amani supports street children, giving them a safe place to stay and educational and emotional support. Check out the new school, which has been built with the help of donors, and be inspired by this project which is changing these children's lives. For more information on this project visit www.amanikids.org.

Camp in the grounds of the Marangu Hotel, a beautiful turn-of-the-century farmhouse set in 12 acres of delightful tropical gardens. Upgrades are available on request and the hotel also has a great bar and pool.

Take a walking tour of Mshiri Village, the base for the Village Education Project, and witness the day-to-day life of the Chagga people, long established as crop-growers on the fertile slopes of Mt Kilimanjaro. Walk around their shamba (farm) and have the chance to sample the local Chagga food, which is very filling. For more information on the Village Education Project visit www.kiliproject.org.

Visit nearby waterfalls and stop to admire the view of the plains below. If the weather is clear, get a view of Kilimanjaro - the magnificent snow-capped mountain and Africa's highest peak at 5,895 m (19,340 ft).

Included Activities

Visit and donation to Amani Children's Home - en route to Marangu

Village Education Project visit, village walk; lunch

Accommodation

Camping (with facilities) (2 nts)

It's time to get off the well-beaten track and head into the remote Tanzanian mountains (265 km, approx 7 hrs).

The Usambara Mountains are a lovely unspoilt area of Tanzania. Unlike the coast and the north, very few tourists visit this area so it has a freshness that can be hard to find elsewhere. The mountains are located in the north-east of Tanzania, between Kilimanjaro and the Indian Ocean, and overlook the vast Masai steppe. They are wonderfully lush and green and the area has been dubbed the Galapagos of the plant world. The forests stretch across the mountains and are ideal for easy hikes and guided walks. As beautiful as the place is, its real jewels are the local people and villages.

Explore the beautiful Usambara Mountains and experience this area's gentle hospitality on a visit to some of its small communities. From our base, we'll organise a short days walking trip out to the beautiful Irente viewpoint. On our way back, visit a local cultural and ecological project based at Irente farm and enjoy a picnic lunch.

Our base is the old German colony of Lushoto where we stay in the grounds of one of the earliest hotels in Africa. Our campsite has flush toilets and showers.

Included Activities

Irente day walk; local lunch

Accommodation

Camping (with facilities) (2 nts)

Catch a ferry to the 'Spice Island' of Zanzibar (approx 90 mins).

Filled with idyllic beaches, winding cobblestone alleyways and fragrant bazaars, Zanzibar's rich history involves everything from slave traders to Arabian sultans and fruit exporters. The sight of traditional dhows sailing along the coast invokes images of what the island was like back in the days of Livingstone.

Enjoy a tour of the inland plantations where Zanzibar's famous spices grow. First, discover the sights of old Stone Town, where you will hear a history of the slave market and delight in a local meal. Next, you will drive to the spice plantations where you'll receive a guided tour and the opportunity to touch, smell and taste various spices such as cinnamon, vanilla and ginger, as well as teas made with these spices. At the end of the day there will also be an opportunity to buy some of the locally grown spices.

There are numerous other activities available including a tour around this historic island, a dhow trip, a boat trip to snorkel with dolphins, and the opportunity to scuba dive.

Our hotel is situated near Stone Town. It has a large pool, good restaurant and bar facilities as well as plenty of beach frontage - an ideal place to relax after an overland trip.

Included Activities

Spice tour

Optional Activities

Snorkelling, Zanzibar - USD40.00

Scuba diving, Zanzibar - USD80.00

Prison island tour, Zanzibar - USD25.00

Dhow trip, Zanzibar - USD40.00

Accommodation

Hotel (4 nts)

Reboard the ferry and return to the beach outside Dar es Salaam. Our trip finishes on arrival at our campsite in Dar es Salaam at approximately 4pm. If you are departing today, please don't book flights until the evening.

There's no accommodation included tonight but we are able to organise an additional night's accommodation as well as airport transfers - please enquire at time of booking.