Safari In Tanzania – Long Journey To Africa
After my month long trip to southeast Asia which started with my scuba diving trip to Sipidan, I really wasn’t planning on another overseas trip this year in 2025. A safari in Africa had always been part of my future travel plans but when I learned about the Great Migration where masses of wildebeest and zebras move north from Tanzania to Kenya crossing dangerous rivers with hungry crocodiles waiting, I knew I was limited to a certain time of the year if I wanted to see this. The best chances to catch these river crossings would be from July to October. So if I didn’t go this early fall season assuming I could get a booking, then I would have to wait an entire year for the next opportunity to see the Great Migration.
I already spent a lot of money on two long trips to southeast Asia in the last 12 months both centred around big scuba diving trips and a ski trip to Zermatt in Switzerland. Since I’m already pretty committed to return to Indonesia next summer to dive Komodo on another live aboard after already diving Raja Ampat, I decided that if I could get a decent safari booking this year, I’ll bite the bullet as far as my travel funds and just go for it.
For safari trips, there are three main price ranges with high end being five star luxury accommodations and low end budget being staying at camp sites in tents. I don’t need luxury but staying in camping tents is also out of the question for me too since toilet facilities are in separate areas and campers need to be escorted to them during night time because there are dangerous animals out in the bush as camp sites are never fenced in.
No matter what price range you pay for, the actual animals you see during the safari game drives are the same so higher level accommodations does not mean you see more or better animals. As a nice compromise, the mid range price level involves tented rooms which have ensuite bathrooms which is exactly what I wanted even though I would still not be allowed to walk outside after dark on my own but at least I could stay inside my own tented cabins with their ensuite toilets.
I shot the video below of the two such tented cabins I stayed in while I was in the Serengeti and they were surprisingly comfortable plus they added a sense of safari adventure. Even though I’m kind of jumping ahead to show you this video footage, I thought it might be useful for those who are currently in research and planning modes for a future safari trip to see what these accommodations look like.
I was surprised on how far inland the camps were from the main road but my safari guide Leo told me that all lodges and camps within the Serengeti are like this because they don’t want safari vehicles passing by too close by the camp sites unless they are specifically going to and from the camp. This helps keep noise down. I also tried to give folks in this video an idea of the strange sounds outside I heard overnight as well as some animals that appeared close to my tent in the morning.
Even though these mid priced accommodations were still technically just camps out in the bush, I still enjoyed staying at them which is very surprising for me since I’m not really a camping enthusiast. I felt like I was really on an adventure rather than just on some normal vacation resort. Except for the weak wifi which was pretty well limited to just the main dining and bar areas, I was comfortable enough sleeping in these tented cabins. The overnight noise made by the wildlife outside was strangely entertaining rather than distractive. I could honestly say that I would rather listen to strange animal sounds at night rather than the noise of people, cars and bars often heard in cities (like I did in southeast Asia and Latin America).
Yes the requirement of staff escorting me around after sundown was different but with the ensuite bathrooms in my cabins, I really didn’t find any need to walk around outside much after dinner since the safari game drives during the daytime were so long which made me tired enough to go to sleep quite early. With early morning starts, all guests were inside their cabins relatively early each night as this was definitely not a wild late night party scene.
Below is an additional video I made talking about how to book an African safari since there can be different routes to take as well as explaining the different price levels again for those who are serious about going on an African safari tour.
Arrival In Tanzania
After deciding to book directly with a local Tanzanian safari operator rather than go through a Canadian travel agency that books safari trips (which most certainly would have resulted in a higher cost), I decided to book with a small mid price tour operator called Safari By Leo since they were able to design an itinerary that suited my needs and they have good reviews on both Google and Trip Advisor (I’ve since added my own reviews of them on both platforms too). I also booked directly for my past scuba diving live aboards so was quite comfortable going through this direct route even if it involved sending wire payments through my bank to overseas companies I’ve never heard of before. Here’s my video testimonial for Safari By Leo in case any potential future safari tourists are interested.
I got some reasonable flights from Canada to Tanzania but still required two separate overnight red eye flights to get there which don’t work well for me for sleeping. I had originally planned a long daytime layover in Frankfurt and was hoping to get out to the city for several hours on my way to Africa but on the first overnight flight from Canada, I got stuck in a middle seat with barely any sleep so I ended up just staying at the Frankfurt airport until the next overnight flight to Africa. This next flight worked out a lot better as I ended up with an entire day row of four seats in the middle section of the plane and was able to lie down for the first time in about 20 hours (I wasn’t so lucky on my homebound flights back to Canada though).
Upon my early morning arrival in Tanzania after flying right by Mount Kilimanjaro, I was then stuck in a long lineup at immigration. The immigration officials didn’t even pay attention to my yellow fever card as it turned out that I probably could have skipped this costly $325 vaccine (but also had all sorts of other pre-travel meds for typhoid, cholera, tetanus and malaria). I also paid for the evisa in advance which at $50 US was even costlier than for Vietnam, Cambodia and Indonesia.
Leo and Charles from Safari By Leo welcomed me at the airport after I got through immigration and retrieved my luggage as my important scuba dive gear made it through. After a local lunch, Leo dropped me off at a hotel in Arusha which is the small city that most safaris in Tanzania start from. Here I got the rest of the day to get some much needed rest after that long journey from Canada. By the way, look for my upcoming interesting interview I conducted with Leo given that she is only one of 25 female safari guides in Tanzania.
Additional Components Of My Africa Trip
I should mention here that in addition to the week long safari portion of my trip, there were two additional components I decided to add to make this a two week long Africa trip. For trips involving really long flights like this one (and to southeast Asia), I’m trying to make my stays overseas longer to make these tough journeys more worthwhile. Since I was already in the region, I wanted to scuba dive in the islands off the Tanzania coast.
The best reported dive locations were Mafia Island and Pemba Island with Zanzibar as another possible option. If I didn’t stay to do a bit of scuba diving here I would probably hit myself later. The big problem is that in order to get to these islands from Kilimanjaro and back, I would require five separate propellor planes and they were not cheap. So I booked all of these prop plane flights online in advance while still in Canada to get in three nights and two days of diving at Mafia Island and three nights in Zanzibar just for culture. Separate articles with photos and videos on Mafia Island and Zanzibar will be posted after all the safari ones are done.
So after my much needed rest in the Arusha hotel after my long two day journey from Canada, I was eager for my first day on safari as my guide Leo and I headed to Ngorongoro Crater.
