3 Days Mount Ol Doinyo Lengai Trekking Adventure
From - $1,600
per person, sharing
Day-by-Day Itinerary
3 Days Mount Ol Doinyo Lengai Trekking Adventure
- 1
Day 1: Arusha to Lake Natron
Arusha 1,400 m to Lake Natron 600 m
Morning pick up from your Arusha hotel after breakfast. The drive north skirts Mount Meru and Longido, then drops off the Rift Valley escarpment through Maasai grazing country, wide horizons, dust devils, herders on the road, camels and long horned cattle. You reach Engare Sero village on the southern shore of Lake Natron in the late afternoon, check in to your tented camp, and walk down to the lake edge for sunset. The volcano itself dominates the skyline to the south, a perfect cone rising straight from the flats. Dinner at the camp and an early night.
- Accommodation
- Lake Natron Tented Camp or similar
- Meals
- Lunch on the road, dinner at camp
- 2
Day 2: Rest day at Lake Natron and midnight ascent of Ol Doinyo Lengai
Lake Natron 600 m to summit 2,962 m and back, ~1,700 m of ascent
A relaxed morning at Lake Natron. After breakfast you walk with a Maasai guide to the Engare Sero waterfalls, a chain of pools carved into a narrow gorge fed by the escarpment above the lake, wonderful for a swim in the heat of the day. In the afternoon you visit a nearby Maasai boma, meet the family, hear how they live at the foot of the mountain, and stroll to the flamingo flats where lesser flamingos feed by the thousand in the shallows. Back at camp for an early dinner and a short rest. At around 23:30 you are collected by your climbing guide and driven the short distance to the base of Ol Doinyo Lengai for the midnight start. The route is unmarked scree, steep and continuous, with no technical climbing but a relentless underfoot pull. You climb by headtorch, layer by layer, pausing often. The gradient eases briefly halfway up before steepening again for the final push to the crater rim, timed for sunrise. From the summit you look down on the steaming vents of the active crater, out across Lake Natron catching the first pink light, and east to the distant Rift escarpments. After time on the rim you begin the long descent, harder in some ways than the ascent because of the loose scree, and reach the base by mid morning.
- Accommodation
- Lake Natron Tented Camp, second night
- Meals
- Breakfast, lunch, packed summit snacks, dinner
- 3
Day 3: Lake Natron back to Arusha
Lake Natron 600 m to Arusha 1,400 m
A late breakfast at camp after summit night, with time to swim or rest. Around mid morning you climb the Rift escarpment on the drive south, stopping at viewpoints looking back over the lake and the volcano. You reach Arusha in the mid to late afternoon in time for onward connections, a Kilimanjaro climb, a safari, or a flight to Zanzibar.
- Accommodation
- Not included, drop off at your Arusha hotel
- Meals
- Breakfast, lunch on the road
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