6-Day Northern Tanzania Marvels

Your honeymoon begins the moment you land. At Kilimanjaro International Airport, or any other arrival point, a member of the Gip Adventure team welcomes you to Tanzania with a romantic meet-and-greet before a safe, comfortable road transfer to your lodge in Arusha.

Our safari coordinators give you a short briefing on the days ahead, and then the afternoon is yours. Stroll through the lodge's peaceful gardens, unwind after the long journey and look out for the rugged peaks of majestic Mount Meru rising above the town.

Dinner is served at the lodge, followed by your first night in Tanzania.

After breakfast at around 08:00, your safari driver-guide collects you for the drive to Tarangire National Park, a magnificent wildlife sanctuary of 2,850 sq km lying some 120 km south-west of Arusha.

Tarangire is famous for outstanding game viewing in the dry season, when animals from every corner of the park gather along the great Tarangire River – their main source of water at that time of year. The river runs for around 120 km from the Kondoa highlands in Dodoma Region, central Tanzania, meandering through the park before emptying into Lake Burunge. Expect to see a wide variety of wildlife moving freely in its natural environment, beneath the park's enormous baobab trees.

After a hearty picnic lunch in the park, enjoy a final, thrilling game drive before heading to your lodge in the small, dusty town of Karatu for dinner and a restful night.

After breakfast at around 08:00, leave Karatu and climb into the Ngorongoro highlands on your way west to Serengeti National Park. Along the way, visit Olduvai Gorge, the Cradle of Mankind, and the Kigeni shifting sands – a large, black volcanic dune that is magnetic in nature – and stop at a Maasai boma to meet the local Maasai and greet them in their own homes.

Lunch is served at a picnic site before you enter the endless plains of the Serengeti, with game drives en route into the central part of the park. Golden and sun-baked in the dry season, this is the land of the great annual wildebeest migration – animals 'born to move', forever in search of fresh grazing and good breeding grounds. It is also a stage for drama: spotted hyenas, African painted dogs and the great crocodiles of the rivers hunt here, while jackals and vultures wait patiently for their chance to feast.

As the afternoon light softens, continue to your camp for dinner and a tranquil night in the African bush.

After breakfast at around 08:00, venture deep into the Serengeti for a full day of game drives. The park is famous for its green carpet in the wet season and its golden carpet in the dry, and its serene landscapes hold some of the finest wildlife viewing in Africa.

Depending on the season, you may find yourselves surrounded by vast herds of wildebeest and zebra on the move. When the migration reaches the 395 km Mara River – which rises in central Kenya and flows into Lake Victoria – huge Nile crocodiles lie unseen beneath the water, waiting. The herds plunge in regardless, driven on by an instinct as old as the plains themselves, while predators pick off the weak and the old.

Savour every moment, with a picnic lunch out on the plains, followed by dinner and a peaceful night back at your camp.

A second full day in the Serengeti gives you time to explore further and linger longer wherever the action is. Your driver-guide follows the herds and the predators, from lion prides resting in the shade of acacias to cheetahs scanning the plains from termite mounds.

The Serengeti is home to the Big Five and to the famous 'ugly five' – the hyena, vulture, marabou stork, warthog and wildebeest – and each drive brings something new. In the right season, the migration's river crossings are among the most dramatic sights in the natural world.

Enjoy a leisurely picnic lunch in the bush and return to your camp in the evening for dinner and another tranquil night under the stars.

Following breakfast at around 08:00, enjoy a final game drive as you leave the central Serengeti and head for the Ngorongoro Conservation Area, before descending 610 m into its world-famous caldera.

The crater floor covers some 260 sq km and supports an extraordinary concentration of wildlife: big-tusked elephants, dark-maned lions in their prime, large herds of buffalo and wildebeest, pods of hippos and dazzles of zebra. The saline Lake Magadi is busy with waders and waterfowl, and the Big Five live here freely. Your guide will also listen out for the booming call of the ostrich among the crater's many bird species.

Lunch is served at a picnic site in the crater before you drive up out of the crater and on by road to Kilimanjaro International Airport in time for your onward international flight home (transfer timing depends on your flight schedule).

Everyone at Gip Adventure Tours & Safaris wishes you a safe journey home, carrying memories of your honeymoon that will last a lifetime.