Lake Manyara National Park

Beautifull place

I started my Tanzania trip in Lake Manyara and there was my first wildlife encounters of my eastern Africa trip
Drive around the Rift Valley is an awsome experience and we found a lot of wildlife there
Baboons, Blue and Vervet monkeys in the jungles, Elephants, giraffes, buffalos, waterbucks, dik dik, zebras, hippos are easy to spot
One of the best thinks is the new flamingo watching platform. I spent hours there watching and photographing flamingos.

Lake Manyara
Absolutely Worth it

An amazing place to experience safari

With the Ngorogoro crater being the star attraction, it would be easy to overlook Lake Manyara for a safari. However, thankfully, we didn't and had an amazing time there.
We saw a wide range of wildlife such as Elephants, Babboons, Sea Eagles, Kingfishers as well as Flamingo's which the park is famous for.
The scenery in the park varies. When you enter, you travel through forest but once you reach the viewpoints over the lake, the land stretches on for miles over open plains.
We were there in August and the temperature was moderate (mid 20's) so pleasant enough without being unbearable.
The park is less crowded than Ngorogoro which means that it feels a little more personal.
If you only had one day to do a safari, would I pick Lake Manyara?.....well probably not because Ngorogoro is deservedly one of the most incredible places I've visited. However, don't overlook Manyara; you'll have a different but amazing time there too.

Accommodations overlooking the great rift valley wonderful views. The park has the chance to see a lot of wildlife, and from a scenery standpoint is average. This was were we started our game drives. Worth visiting, but not my favorite location.

Maybe, at other times of year Lake Manyara National Park might be better with more wildlife, we did see some unique and endemic bird species here, and Klipspringer antelope that we didn't see elsewhere.

It's different if you compare it with the Serengeti and Ngorongoro. We have seen a lot of monkey's and less bigger animals. But a visit, oh yes it is worthwhile.

After visiting both Serengeti and Ngorongoro this park was not as exciting anymore, however it is a good park and you can spot a lot of animals and a few species that did not exist in the other parks.

Small but one of my favorite parks in Tanzania. Wildlife and birds are abundant, however depending on the water-level on Lake Manyara.

Good birding in the park, wildlife is less, but still some herbivores in the park. There are lots of waterfowls in the park and good flamingo's in the lake in the right season .

Lake Manyara is a beautiful place to stop by for a visit. It is located in a populated area so the feeling of wilderness and isolation is not there. It is however, a very beautiful destination and worth a visit.

Not as spectacular as Serengeti or Ngorongoro but good close up views of elephants. Close to Arusha too