3-Day Mikumi National Park Safari

The three-day version of the Mikumi safari gives you a full extra day inside the park, which changes the experience completely. Where the two-day trip is a quick city-to-plains escape, the three-day trip lets you cover the whole of the Mkata Floodplain properly, spend time at the Hippo Pool without rushing, work the Chamgore area for python and predators, and reach the Mwanambogo dam - one of the best places in the park to sit quietly and let wildlife come to water.

You leave Dar es Salaam in the morning on day one and reach the park in the early afternoon, either by a four to five hour road transfer or the 1.5-hour SGR train to Morogoro followed by a road transfer. Lunch at the lodge, then an afternoon game drive on the Mkata plains for elephant, lion, giraffe, wildebeest and zebra, returning to the lodge for dinner and an overnight stay.

Day two is the heart of the trip: a full-day game drive with a packed lunch in the bush, working the northern plains, the Hippo Pool, Chamgore and the Mkata River corridor. This is the day tree-climbing lions and leopards are most likely to appear, and when the plains show off - vast herds of buffalo, giraffe browsing acacia, lion at rest under sausage trees, and hundreds of birds circling on the thermals.

Day three is a final sunrise drive to catch predators active in the cool of the morning, breakfast at the lodge, then the return transfer to Dar es Salaam in time for an evening flight or connection. If you have longer, this itinerary combines seamlessly with a Zanzibar beach stay, an Udzungwa hiking extension or a Nyerere (Selous) boat safari.