Tanzania honeymoon safari with Zanzibar

Itinerary in brief:

• 2 nights full board Amini Maasai Lodge (Kilimanjaro)
• 1 night full board Maweninga Camp (Tarangire National Park)
• 1 night full board Bashay Rift (Karatu for Ngorongoro National Park)
• 1 night full board Olduvai Camp (Olduvai Gorge)
• 2 nights full board Mara River Post (Serengeti National Park)
• 5 nights all-inclusive at Tulia Zanzibar 

Day 1: Depart UK

Depart the UK from your chosen airport.

Included: International flights

Day 2: Arrival - Amini Maasai Lodge

When you land at Kilimanjaro airport, you’ll be met on arrival and transferred to Amini Maasai Lodge. The journey will take around an hour and a half. You’ll stay in a cosy solar-powered earth house with a European toilet and shower. This unique lodge has a beautiful swimming pool, a sun terrace and a cosy restaurant serving traditional Swahili food.

Included: Arrival transfer, accommodation, all meals

Day 3: Amini Maasai Lodge

This morning, you’ll wake up to a majestic view of Kilimanjaro. After breakfast, you’ll set off on a nature walk with a local Maasai guide. As you walk, you’ll learn about the medicinal plants and herbs of the Maasai culture and prepare traditional tea together.

During your stay, you can also take part in a spear-throwing competition, a deeply-rooted ritual in Maasai tradition, or set off on a donkey ride across the African steppe. There are also all kinds of optional activities on offer, from visiting the local women’s workshop and nearby market to spending time in a Maasai boma. Amini Maasai is hugely involved with the local community, so your stay will directly benefit the Maasai people of the area.

Included: Accommodation, all meals, Maasai guided nature walk and spear-throwing.

Day 4: Tarangire National Park

After breakfast this morning, you’ll set off on the journey to Tarangire National Park to begin your safari. Less famous than Tanzania’s other wildlife reserves, Tarangire feels like a true wilderness. Scattered with ancient baobab trees, acacia groves, rocky outcrops, and meandering rivers, it’s a natural wonderland that seems untouched by human hands. Famous for its tree-climbing lions and huge herds of elephants, there’s nowhere better to begin your safari.

When you enter Tarangire, you’ll start your game drive, looking for prowling lions along the riverbanks and grazing herds on the grasslands. You’ll stop for a picnic lunch along the way. In the afternoon, you’ll make your way to Maweninga Camp, arriving in time for sunset. After dinner, you can grab a nightcap by the campfire as playful rock dassies scamper over the rocks around you.

Hidden away in a remote area of Tarangire, Maweninga offers real rustic romance. Built atop a huge granite boulder that rises from the bush, it’s a completely unique camp. You’ll sleep in a spacious canvas safari tent with uninterrupted views over Lake Manyara and the Rift Valley.

Included: Accommodation, expert driver-guide, all meals and safari activities.  

Day 5: Tarangire National Park

You’ll spend a full day exploring Tarangire National Park on the lookout for creatures great and small. Second only to the Serengeti in terms of the concentration of wildlife, it’s home to 250,000 animals. Here, you can see herds of up to 300 elephants gently plodding through the scrubland or crossing the shallow rivers. It’s a breathtaking place.

After an action-packed day, you’ll leave Tarangire and drive to Karatu, near to the rim of the Ngorongoro Crater. In contrast to the gnarled landscape of Tarangire, this lush area is overflowing with tropical plants and flowers. You’ll stay at Bashay Rift Lodge, a beautiful property set within gorgeous gardens that has the feeling of an African organic farm. When you arrive, you can jump in the sparkling swimming pool and wash off the dusty day on safari.

Included: Accommodation, expert driver-guide, all meals, and safari activities.                 

Day 6: Ngorongoro Crater and Olduvai Gorge

You’ll set off early this morning to explore the extraordinary Ngorongoro Crater. Descending from the forested rim into the Crater, along a steep and wildly scenic road, you’ll find a natural wonderland like no other.

The Ngorongoro Crater is a huge volcanic caldera that stretches across over 100 square miles and its grasslands are home to 30,000 large mammals. Here, you’ll find elephants, black rhinoceroses, leopards, buffalo, zebras, warthogs, wildebeests, gazelles, and the densest population of lions in the world. The crater is also home to Lake Magadi, a shallow soda ash lake packed with pink flamingos.

You’ll spend the morning and early afternoon exploring the Crater, stopping for a picnic lunch in a shady grove on the way. Afterwards, you’ll drive back up the rim and head towards Olduvai Gorge. Located between the Ngorongoro Crater and the Serengeti National Park in the Great Rift Valley, Olduvai Gorge is an astonishing place and one of the most important prehistoric sites in the world.

You’ll spend the night at Olduvai Camp, built around a kopje that rises from the otherworldly, lunar-like landscape of the gorge. It’s a truly one-of-a-kind experience that you’ll never forget. After you’ve checked into your comfortable canvas tent, you’ll take a sunset walk with a local Maasai guide to a nearby viewpoint, stopping for a sundowner as you soak up the staggering views.  

Included: Accommodation, expert driver-guide, all meals and safari activities.  

Day 7: Serengeti National Park

After breakfast, you’ll begin the journey to the world-famous Serengeti National Park for a full day of game drives. Meaning ‘Endless Plains’ in the Maasai language, the savannah of the Serengeti really does feel like it stretches on forever. In addition to the Big Five, it’s home to great numbers of spotted hyenas, warthogs, hippos, giraffes, cheetahs, and baboons. You’ll also find crocodiles scouring the riverbanks and more than 350 species of birds, including ostriches and flamingos.

In the afternoon, your driver-guide will take you to Mara River Post, your home for the next two nights. You’ll stay in an ensuite safari tent with a veranda offering unbroken views over the savannah. The main camp sits on a raised platform, with a gorgeous swimming pool that looks out over the Mara River. If you travel in summer, during the months of the Great Migration, you can see herds of wildebeest crossing the Serengeti as they head towards Kenya’s Masai Mara.

Included: Accommodation, expert driver-guide, all meals and safari activities.  

Day 8: Serengeti National Park

After breakfast, you’ll spend another day looking for wildlife on the plains of Serengeti with your expert driver and guide. Between game drives, you can relax in the pool, enjoy a massage or soak up the panoramic views from your romantic private veranda.

Included: Accommodation, expert driver-guide, all meals and safari activities.

Day 9: Serengeti National Park - Zanzibar           

After breakfast, you’ll be transferred to the nearby Kogatende airstrip and fly (via Arusha) to Zanzibar. Leaving the Serengeti by small plane is an unforgettable experience in itself, as you see vast herds grazing below you from the skies. 

When you arrive in Zanzibar, you’ll be collected at the airport and transferred to Tulia Zanzibar, where you’ll stay in a luxury seafront villa on an all-inclusive basis for the next five nights. Voted the ‘Most Romantic Beach Resort in the World’, there really is nowhere better to stay on your honeymoon and your luxury seafront villa is in the best location in the resort.

Your villa will be perched overlooking the beach with uninterrupted sea views, a private decking area and a breathtaking sunrise. During your stay, you’ll be treated to a complimentary couples massage and a romantic private dinner under the stars.

Included: Airport transfers, flight from Kogatende to Zanzibar, accommodation, all meals.

Days 10 - 13: Zanzibar

The next few days are free for you to relax, soak up the tropical sunshine and swim in the clear turquoise waters from the resort’s private beach. If you’re keen to explore, you can book a snorkelling expedition or take a trip to Jozani Forest. All meals and drinks are included, and the resort specialises in fresh organic food with a traditional Tanzanian vibe.

Included: Accommodation, all meals, couples massage and private dinner.         

Day 14: Zanzibar - UK         

Today, you’ll be collected from your resort and driven to the airport in time to catch your flight home to the UK.

Included: Airport transfers and international flights.