5-Day A Luxury Tour by Air (Mto wa Mbu, Ngorongoro, Serengeti)

Your driver guide meets you at Kilimanjaro International Airport or Arusha Airport with a warm welcome and drives you west towards the Rift Valley. On the way you stop at Mto wa Mbu, the village famously known as 'Mosquito Creek', for an exhilarating cultural tour.

Experience the vibrant traditions and generous hospitality of the local communities: learn about their way of life, join in traditional dances, try on their attire, help herd the cattle, taste local dishes and listen to their age-old stories. Afterwards you set off on a bike ride towards Lake Manyara, a refreshing way to take in the countryside.

In the late afternoon you continue up the Rift Valley wall to the small, dusty farming town of Karatu for a memorable dinner and your first night at your lodge.

After breakfast at around 08:00 your guide drives you up to the Ngorongoro Conservation Area and down 610 metres into the crater, a vast collapsed volcanic caldera whose permanent water supply sustains extraordinary numbers of animals.

Dark-maned lions show off their physical prowess, great wrinkled elephants wander the swamps, and large herds of buffalo, wildebeest, zebra, warthog and gazelle graze the floor. This is a natural home of the Big Five, where black rhino roam freely, and the birdlife ranges from the ostrich, the world's largest bird, to the kori bustard, the heaviest bird able to fly.

Enjoy a picnic lunch beneath the crater walls, then a final short game drive before returning to your lodge in Karatu for dinner and the night.

After breakfast you head west towards the Serengeti. Along the way you visit the Shifting Sands, a dune of black, magnetic volcanic ash around 9 metres high and 100 metres long that creeps 17–20 metres westwards across the Ngorongoro Conservation Area every year.

You then stop at Olduvai Gorge and its museum, one of the world's most important archaeological sites, where evidence of early humans and the creatures that lived alongside them was uncovered from layers millions of years old.

After a picnic lunch you enter the Serengeti and enjoy a short game drive on the way to your camp in the heart of the park, where dinner and a night in the African bush await.

After breakfast at around 08:00 you set out for a full day exploring the Serengeti, a wildlife sanctuary famous for its beauty and its outstanding game viewing. Depending on the season you may find yourself surrounded by vast herds of wildebeest and zebra on their great migration.

At the right time of year the herds gather on the banks of the 395-kilometre Mara River, which rises in central Kenya and flows into Lake Victoria. Huge Nile crocodiles lie hidden in its waters while the animals plunge across, driven onwards by an ancient instinct, and predators wait for the weak and the stragglers. The Serengeti is home to the Big Five and to the scavengers that follow them.

Savour a picnic lunch in the bush, enjoy a final short game drive, and return to your camp for dinner and another night under the Serengeti sky.

After breakfast, and depending on your flight time, you enjoy a last scenic game drive across the central Serengeti, taking in its rolling landscapes and endless sunlit plains one final time.

Your guide then drops you at Seronera airstrip for your light-aircraft flight to Zanzibar or Arusha, with wonderful views of the plains and highlands as you leave the park behind. We wish you a safe journey and a lifetime of memories.