Introduction

Tarangire National park is one of the largest safari game parks in Tanzania yet receives a minimal number of tourists in a year. The park occupies an area of more than 2,600sq km southeast of Lake Manyara National park, near the safari town of Arusha (to the southwest).

The Tarangire River crosses through the park draining into several swamps and floodplains found in the park. The rest of the park area is covered in grasslands, traditional baobab trees, doum palms, acacia woodlands, and many other trees recorded to be more than 100 years old.

Thirsty nomads have wandered hundreds of parched kilometers knowing that here, always, there is water. Park size: 2,600 sq km (1,005 sq miles).

Herds of up to 300 elephants scratch the dry river bed for underground streams, while migratory wildebeest, zebra, buffalo, impala, gazelle, hartebeest, and eland crowd the shrinking lagoons. It's the greatest concentration of wildlife outside the Serengeti ecosystem - a smorgasbord for predators - and the one place in Tanzania where dry-country antelope such as the stately fringe-eared Oryx and peculiar long-necked gerenuk are regularly observed. During the rainy season, the seasonal visitors scatter over a 20,000 sq km (12,500 sq miles) range until they exhaust the green plains and the river calls once more.

On drier ground, you find the Kori bustard, the heaviest flying bird; the stocking thighed ostrich, the world's largest bird; and small parties of ground hornbills blustering like turkeys. More ardent bird-lovers might keep an eye open for screeching flocks of the dazzlingly colorful Yellow-collared lovebird, and the somewhat drabber Rufous-tailed weaver and ashy starling - all endemic to the dry savannah of north-central Tanzania.