Madete Turtle Beach

For many years, A Tent With A View has supported the green turtle project at Madete, although it was not always easy to monitor. In recent years, with considerable assistance from Catharine Joynson-Hicks and her ngo Seasense, the project has improved dramatically and the keen young co-ordinator Hamisi is now doing an excellent job. In 2009, a record number of nests have been found and we have had many opportunities to see young turtles hatching from the sand, particularly in July, August and September.

In March 2011 we were delighted and extremely fortunate to witness turtles hatching from eggs laid within our actual lodge grounds, much to the excitement of our guests staying with us at that time

Walking Safaris

Walking safaris in Saadani offer a unique opportunity to study animal behavior through the comprehensive trails left around the salt flats. These areas that dominate much of the coastal landscape are favoured by many animals as safe, open resting places in the night. Predators will often move into the areas following the game. Come the early morning, a foot safari can reveal interesting stories about which animals slept where and which animals were watching them intently!

Boat Safaris

Whilst we can combine a full day game drive with boat safari from the Lodge, a boat safari is best combined with a night in our exclusive seasonal camp set on the banks of the Wami River as early morning and late afternoon are the best times to explore the river.

Game Drives

Our 4×4 game drive vehicles are all custom-made for the best game viewing and photography opportunities. We offer full and half day game drives and a full day game drive can be combined with a boat safari on the Wami River.

Dar es Salaam (“harbour of peace”), formerly Mzizima, is the largest city in Tanzania. It is also the country’s richest city and a regionally important economic centre. Dar es Salaam is actually an administrative province within Tanzania, and consists of three local government areas or administrative districts: Kinondoni to the north, Ilala in the centre of the region, and Temeke to the south. The Dar es Salaam Region had a population of 2,497,940 as of the official 2002 census. Though Dar es Salaam lost its official status as capital city to Dodoma in 1974 (a move which was not complete until 1996), it remains the centre of the permanent central government bureaucracy and continues to serve as the capital for the surrounding Dar es Salaam Region.

Once an important port and trading post on the Indian Ocean, Kaole turned into ruins when the town was abandoned. What remains now are some fascinating ruins of two mosques and graves – and an old baobab tree.
After a visit to the nearby crocodile farm, the driver I had arranged in Dar es Salaam parked our car under a tree at the entrance of Kaole ruins. I bought a ticket, not just for myself, but also for the driver, as he had never visited Kaole himself. Right at the entrance, we walked up to the remains of a 13th century mosque. Made of grey coral stone, it was easy to recognize the structure, the stairs leading up to the spot where calls for prayers were once made five times a day, and after walking through the entrance, the layout of the mosque was still very clear. I inevitably wondered what the mosque would have looked like when it was operational. This is supposedly one of the oldest mosques in East Africa.

Bagamoyo was recently designated as Tanzania’s seventh world heritage site and is the oldest town in Tanzania. Bagamoyo’s history has been influenced by Arab and Indian traders, the German colonial government and Christian missionaries. Although Bagamoyo is no longer the busy port city that it once was, Tanzania’s Department of Antiquities is working to revitalize the town and maintain the dozens of ruins in and around Bagamoyo.

Bagamoyo was the major slave trading post in East Africa. Bagamoyo, which means ‘lay down your heart’ in Swahili, was probably given this name because Bagamoyo was the last place the slaves would stay in Tanzania before being shipped off to foreign lands. Although the slave trade officially ended in 1873, slaves continued to be sold and traded in Bagamoyo through the end of the nineteenth century.

During the slave trade, it was not uncommon to see hundreds of slaves walking through the streets of Bagamoyo chained together by the neck. Slaves were collected from the interior by capture, purchase or trade and then shipped to Zanzibar or Arab countries.

Size: 1,100 sq km

Palm trees sway in a cooling oceanic breeze. White sand and blue water sparkle alluringly beneath the tropical sun. Traditional dhows sail slowly past, propelled by billowing white sails, while Swahili fishermen cast their nets below a brilliant red sunrise.

Saadani is where the beach meets the bush. The only wildlife sanctuary in East Africa to boast an Indian Ocean beachfront, it possesses all the attributes that make Tanzania’s tropical coastline and islands so popular with European sun-worshippers. Yet it is also the one place where those idle hours of sunbathing might be interrupted by an elephant strolling past, or a lion coming to drink at the nearby waterhole!

Protected as a game reserve since the 1960s, in 2002 it was expanded to cover twice its former area. The reserve suffered greatly from poaching prior to the late 1990s, but recent years have seen a marked turnaround, due to a concerted clampdown on poachers, based on integrating adjacent villages into the conservation drive.

Today, a surprisingly wide range of grazers and primates is seen on game drives and walks, among them giraffe, buffalo, warthog, common waterbuck, reedbuck, hartebeest, wildebeest, red duiker, greater kudu, eland, sable antelope, yellow baboon and vervet monkey.

Herds of up to 30 elephants are encountered with increasing frequency, and several lion prides are resident, together with leopard, spotted hyena and black-backed jackal. Boat trips on the mangrove-lined Wami River come with a high chance of sighting hippos, crocodiles and a selection of marine and riverine birds, including the mangrove kingfisher and lesser flamingo, while the beaches form one of the last major green turtle breeding sites on mainland Tanzania.

AREA : 1577 Sq. Km.
ALTITUDE: 1800 Metres

Mahale National Park lies 120km. south of Kigoma on a peninsular that cuts out into Lake Tanganyika. The park is dominated by the Mahale Mountain chain running from north-east across the middle of the park, the highest peak being 2462m. above sea level. Like Gombe, the Mahale Mountains is home to someof the last remaining wild chimpanzees in Africa. Between 700 – 1000 of these fascinating animals roam the valleys and hills of Mahale.

The park vegetation is mainly Miombo woodlands with narrow strips of riverine forest. The park enjoys the habitat of a variety of primates including: yellow baboon, vervet monkey, red and blue colobus monkey, as well as over 200 species of birds.

Thick forest, crystal clear waters and deserted sandy beaches make Mahale one of the most beautiful National Parks in Tanzania

AREA : 52 Sq. Km.
ALTITUDE : 773-1500 Metres]

Situated 16kms north of Kigoma town in western Tanzania, Gombe is a narrow mountainous strip of the country bounded to the east by the crest of the rift valley escarpment and by Lake Tanganyika to the west. It is a fragile remnant of Chimpanzee habitat. The beauty of Gombe National Park is unique; it is a park without roads, where you can walk and experience nature with all your senses, in its pristine manner.

Due to its altitude, the park’s vegetation varies from ever green forests of tall trees to open woodlands and grassland. Common mammals found in the park are forest species, mostly primates. These include chimpanzee, baboon, blue monkey, red tailed monkey and red colobus monkey. Jane Goodall brought the Chimps of Gombe to world fame through her research projects based here, and various projects still continue to operate.

Chimpanzees are very amusing and intelligent animals and it is interesting to observe them in their natural habitat engaged in different activities. Likely to be seen in addition to the famous chimpanzees, are the colourful red-tail and blue colobus monkeys. Herbivores and carnivores are a rarity in the forests, making Gombe a heaven for walking safaris.

Size: 412.9 sq km

Locals refer to the Kitulo Plateau as Bustani ya Mungu – The Garden of God – while botanists have dubbed it the Serengeti of Flowers, host to ‘one of the great floral spectacles of the world’. And Kitulo is indeed a rare botanical marvel, home to a full 350 species of vascular plants, including 45 varieties of terrestrial orchid, which erupt into a riotous wildflower display of breathtaking scale and diversity during the main rainy season of late November to April.

Perched at around 2,600 metres (8,500 ft) between the rugged peaks of the Kipengere, Poroto and Livingstone Mountains, the well-watered volcanic soils of Kitulo support the largest and most important montane grassland community in Tanzania.

One of the most important watersheds for the Great Ruaha River, Kitulo is well known for its floral significance – not only a multitude of orchids, but also the stunning yellow-orange red-hot poker and a variety of aloes, proteas, geraniums, giant lobelias, lilies and aster daisies, of which more than 30 species are endemic to southern Tanzania.
Big game is sparsely represented, though a few hardy mountain reedbuck and eland still roam the open grassland.

But Kitulo – a botanist and hiker’s paradise – is also highly alluring to birdwatchers. Tanzania’s only population of the rare Denham’s bustard is resident, alongside a breeding colony of the endangered blue swallow and such range-restricted species as mountain marsh widow, Njombe cisticola and Kipengere seedeater. Endemic species of butterfly, chameleon, lizard and frog further enhance the biological wealth of God’s Garden.

Size: 4,471 sq km

Untrammeled and seldom visited, Katavi is a true wilderness, providing the few intrepid souls who make it there with a thrilling taste of Africa as it must have been a century ago.

Tanzania’s third largest national park, it lies in the remote southwest of the country, within a truncated arm of the Rift Valley that terminates in the shallow, brooding expanse of Lake Rukwa.

The bulk of Katavi supports a hypnotically featureless cover of tangled brachystegia woodland, home to substantial but elusive populations of the localized eland, sable and roan antelopes. But the main focus for game viewing within the park is the Katuma River and associated floodplains such as the seasonal Lakes Katavi and Chada. During the rainy season, these lush, marshy lakes are a haven for myriad waterbirds, and they also support Tanzania’s densest concentrations of hippo and crocodile.

It is during the dry season, when the floodwaters retreat, that Katavi truly comes into its own. The Katuma, reduced to a shallow, muddy trickle, forms the only source of drinking water for miles around, and the flanking floodplains support game concentrations that defy belief. An estimated 4,000 elephants might converge on the area, together with several herds of 1,000-plus buffalo, while an abundance of giraffe, zebra, impala and reedbuck provide easy pickings for the numerous lion prides and spotted hyena clans whose territories converge on the floodplains.

Katavi’s most singular wildlife spectacle is provided by its hippos. Towards the end of the dry season, up to 200 individuals might flop together in any riverine pool of sufficient depth. And as more hippos gather in one place, so does male rivalry heat up – bloody territorial fights are an everyday occurrence, with the vanquished male forced to lurk hapless on the open plains until it gathers sufficient confidence to mount another challenge.

AREA : 1900 Sq. Km.
ALTITUDE : 300 – 2800 Metres

The major attraction to the park is its biologically diverse and unique forest, of leafy glades freckled with sunshine. Udzungwa Mountains National Park also harbours plant species found nowhere else in the world, from a tiny African violet to 30m. high trees.

Of its six types of primate, two are endemic – the Iringa red colobus monkey and the Sanjey Crested Mangabey, not detected until 1979. Four previously unknown species of birds make this Tanzania’s richest forest bird habitat and among the three most important bird conservations areas on the continent. This undisturbed habitat is yet to reveal all its treasures, waiting for further scientific exploration to catalogue its wealth.

This park is of particular interest to those who enjoy trekking, as game viewing is done via the various nature trails on foot. There are no game viewing routes for vehicles in this park.

This park can be visited as an addition to Mikumi and Ruaha.