Ngorongoro Conservation Area Safari Planning Guide

The outstanding feature that gives the conservation area its monstrous Ngorongoro Crator, lying in the Biosphere Reserve in northern Tanzania. The crator covers 8,300 square kilometres (3,204 square miles). The conservation area was planned to accommodate traditional Maasai communities and sustainable tourism. You’ll see Maasai villagers grazing their sheep, goats, and cattle all over the plains.

Ngorongoro Crater lies in a nest of other ominously smoking volcanoes that border the north and west of the conservation area with the Serengeti National Park. The crator is a collapsed volcano whose original volcano, probably higher than Kilimanjaro, collapsed in on itself and now forms a perfect basin.

Once you drive into the Crater’s vastness, you’ll feel at the bottom of a soup bowl with vertically steep sides. The 18 km (11 miles) diameter basin lies 500 meters (1,640 feet) below the rim that towers about 2,200 meters (7,217 feet) above sea level.

The crator is believed to have formed some 2 million years ago. It harbours an astonishing variety of landscapes and natural features, including forests, peaks, craters, valleys, rivers, lakes, and plains. You’ll also find Africa’s most important archaeological site, Olduvai (Oldupai) Gorge, within the Ngorongoro Conservation Area, a few kilometres north of the Crater.

The steep and bumpy drive into the Crater begins high up in the forest. What kills the experience down the crator for many first-time travellers is the sheer number of safari vehicles that clamber into the Crater at opening hours, creating often dusty drives. But once you’ve driven from the masses, the charm of this site slowly showers you with awe.

The conservation area has a lush highland forest that looks like a rainforest. It’s a mist forest relying on the regular and abundant mist and drizzle from the crator. Looking closely enough, you’ll see mist particles swirling like raindrops among the ancient trees.

Pillar wood trees stand sentinel over the figs, the croton trees, evergreen highland Bersama, and wild tobacco purple flowers. The tree trunks and branches support thousands of epiphytes, including specialized plants such as arboreal orchids and ferns. These plants cling to their hosts and absorb moisture with their aerial roots. Even orchids hide among the curtains of tree moss or Old Man’s Beard (as they are locally known).

Monkeys, bushbuck, bushpigs, and elephants frequent the forest, although you’ll unlikely see them. A common site is the hardworking gardeners but zebras and buffaloes beautifully mowing the lawns at some crator lodge compounds. After dark, the ungulates seek sanctuary from predators by hanging out here, and it’s not the dogs you will hear barking after sundown but the warning calls of vigilant zebras and baboons.

On the Crater’s floor spreads a vast flamingo-filled alkaline lake. The shores hold the highest concentration of predators worldwide, including lions, hyenas, jackals, leopards, cheetahs, elephants, and enormous herds of ungulates.

Big-time predators in Ngorongoro Conservation Area expend very little energy in hunting massive herds of prey like Thomson’s and Grant’s gazelles, impalas, giraffes, zebras, and wildebeests. Prides of bloated lions lying on their backs, paws in the air, fully stuffed and embarrassingly damaging their noble Kingly image, are a common sight.

Ngorongoro also has endangered rhinos among its abundant wildlife; a real prize to see one in the wild. You may spot the black and white rhino species on a game drive, but they are not easy to spot. Ngorongoro Crator is also a great place to take a boat safari down one of the hippo-dense rivers.

Birdlife is also spectacular, with some endemic species: the Rufous-tailed weaver, Schalow’s wheatear, and large flocks of the magnificent crowned cranes. If you’re a birder, let your tour operator know beforehand so that they can assign you a guide that understands birds and where to spot them.

Ngorongoro entrance fees are US$70.8 per person for foreigners above sixteen, while kids aged 5-16 pay $23.6. Resident foreigners pay $35.4 while their children pay $11.8. East African nationals pay 11,800 Tanzania shillings, and their kids pay 2,360 shillings.

To enter the Ngorongoro Conservation Area, cars pay a 24-hour pass of US$250, excluding V.A.T. These fees do not cater for activities inside the Crater like meals, walking safaris, etc. Your tour operator will include those in your package, or your accommodation will charge you accordingly.

If you’re doing a self-drive, you’ll need to pay for everything at either the tourism office in Ngorongoro, Lodare visitor centre or the tourism board office in Arusha. You will receive a Ngorongoro card, which you present as you enter the crater entrance. T.I.P. → You can pay in both USD and Tsh, but USD is preferred, and you will need to be accompanied by a licensed guide for this and Oldupai Gorge.

Ensure you pack layered clothing for thick early-morning mist all year round; it gets chilly in the crater rim.

If you are interested in evolution and human origins, Olduvai Gorge, a UNESCO World Heritage Site and one of the world’s most important paleoanthropology sites, is a must-visit. It’s a 90-minute drive from Ngorongoro Crater on a dirt road.

The 48-kilometre-long Gorge is part of the Great Rift Valley, which stretches through East Africa. Its hominid fossils have contributed hugely to palaeoanthro­pologists’ understanding of humanity’s history dating back 2.5 million years. You can visit the quaint little museum at the Gorge, which doesn’t really do justice to the magnitude of fossil discoveries made here.

Move on to the shifting sands, a remarkable dune of volcanic ash appearing utterly out of place on the short grassy plains. Constantly drifting dunes move across the landscape at the prevailing winds, and it’s an intriguing phenomenon to watch.