Lake Manyara National Park

Stretching for 50km along the base of the rusty-gold 600-metre high Rift Valley escarpment, Lake
Manyara is a scenic gem, with a setting extolled by Ernest Hemingway as “the loveliest I had seen in
Africa”. The compact game-viewing circuit through Manyara offers a virtual microcosm of the Tanzanian
safari experience. 

From the entrance gate, the road winds through an expanse of lush jungle-like
groundwater forest where hundred-strong baboon troops lounge nonchalantly along the roadside, blue
monkeys scamper nimbly between the ancient mahogany trees, dainty bushbuck tread warily through
the shadows, and outsized forest hornbills honk cacophonously in the high canopy. Contrasting with the
intimacy of the forest is the grassy floodplain and its expansive views eastward, across the alkaline lake,
to the jagged blue volcanic peaks that rise from the endless Maasai Steppes.

What animals do you see in Lake Manyara National Park?

• Manyara’s legendary tree-climbing lions and impressively tusked elephants
• Large buffalo, wildebeest and zebra herds congregate on these grassy plains, as do giraffes – some so dark in coloration that they appear to be black from a distance.
•  thousands of pink-hued flamingos on their perpetual migration, as well as other large waterbirds such as pelicans, cormorants and storks.