Serengeti National Park

The Serengeti National Park is East Africa’s premier wildlife destination, comprising nearly 15,000 square kilometers of sprawling wilderness. The park is best known as the home to the annual Great Migration of more than two million wildebeest and zebra, which draws visitors from across the globe to witness one of nature’s last truly awe-inspiring spectacles. The Serengeti is also a place where secretive leopards prowl in the shadows of riverine forests and roving lions patrol fiercely contested territories from one horizon to the next. In fact, the high concentration of predator populations is one of the Serengeti’s biggest draws. But how much do you really know about Tanzania’s most famous national park?

Things to Do in Serengeti National Park

The Serengeti’s name is derived from the Maa word siringet, which the Maasai coined to refer to the endless plains in this part of Tanzania. You can expect to see wide-open savanna here, dotted with acacia trees, winding rivers, and large granite outcroppings known locally as kopjes. These boundless plains experience alternating periods of drought and deluge, with two distinct rainy seasons occurring from March to May and November to December. All told, the Serengeti actually forms part of a continuous ecosystem of unimaginable size, transitioning seamlessly into the highlands of Ngorongoro in the south and Kenya’s Maasai Mara in the north. Across the length and breadth of this terrain, the park ranges from an altitude of just 920 meters to the comparatively lofty heights of 1850 meters.

While the park as we know it today was founded in 1951, it wasn’t until 1959 that the Serengeti earned worldwide publicity. This can be attributed in no small part to the release of Serengeti Shall Not Die, an early German nature documentary which exposed many travelers to the wonders of wild Africa for the very first time. Tanzania’s national parks system has come a long way since then, and today travelers can travel tarred roads for just four hours from the main tourist hub of Arusha to reach the Serengeti. This makes the park easy to enjoy as part of Tanzania’s larger Northern Circuit, which also includes stops at Ngorongoro Crater, Lake Manyara, and Tarangire National Park.
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When you visit the Serengeti, many exciting activities are possible. Whether you’re in search of Africa’s most charismatic predators or the many iconic ungulates found here, a classic game drive will be the most rewarding way to enjoy close-up wildlife encounters. You can also go for a walking safari to learn more about the small animals and useful plants of bush while keeping your eyes peeled for the Serengeti’s 500 different species of birds. You can even board a hot air balloon for a breathtaking aerial survey of the Serengeti, earning a bird’s eye view of this truly incredible national park. However you choose to spend your holiday in the Serengeti, it’s bound to be unforgettable!