Ngorongoro is the collapsed cone of a volcano that once stood higher than Kilimanjaro. When the mountain caved in on itself some two and a half million years ago, it left behind a caldera 19 kilometres wide and more than 600 metres deep — the largest unflooded, unbroken caldera on earth. Down on that grassy floor lives one of the densest concentrations of large mammals anywhere in Africa: an estimated 25,000 animals that rarely need to leave, because the crater gives them everything — permanent water, open grazing, acacia woodland and a soda lake tinged pink with flamingos. This is one of the few places on the continent where you can reasonably expect to see all of the Big Five in a single morning, including the black rhino that have all but vanished elsewhere in Tanzania. Beyond the crater rim, the wider Conservation Area is a pioneering experiment in shared land: Maasai herders graze cattle alongside the wildlife across highland plains, the fossil beds of Olduvai Gorge record the earliest chapters of the human story, and the calving herds of the southern Serengeti spill onto the Ndutu plains each green season. A UNESCO World Heritage Site on two counts — for its natural drama and its record of human origins — Ngorongoro rewards the traveller who wants depth as well as spectacle.
Ultra-Luxury7 Days
