The Serengeti National Park is the most photographed and filmed game reserves in Africa. With an incredibly dense population of wildlife and never-ending rolling plains, the Serengeti offers an authentic and idyllic wilderness safari. This is the Africa many of us dream of: an abundance of wildlife, beauty, tranquillity and endless clear, summer days. The Serengeti National Park is located in Tanzania and is over 14 763 square kilometres in size.
The park can be divided into three parts, according to their vegetation; the Serengeti Plains, the Western Corridor, and the Northern Serengeti. The Serengeti is a conservation area; people are prohibited from living in the park unless they are part of park or tourist lodge staff.
The park’s huge wildlife population and annual migration is its greatest claim to fame. Around October, over 1.5 million herbivores travel from the northern hills toward the southern plains, crossing the Mara River, in pursuit of the rains and is a true site to behold as many predators snatch up prey along the way; a spectacle of predator verses prey. In April, they then return to the north through the west, once again crossing the Mara River. This phenomenon is sometimes called the Circular Migration. Over 250 000 wildebeest alone will die along the journey from Tanzania to Masai Mara Reserve in upper Kenya, a total of 800 km. Death is often caused by injury, exhaustion, or predation.
Approximately 70 larger mammal and some 500 avifauna species are found in the Serengeti. This high diversity in terms of species is a function of diverse habitats ranging from riverine forests, swamps, kopjes, grasslands and woodlands. Blue Wildebeests, gazelles, zebras and buffalos are some of the commonly found large mammals in the region.
The Ngorongoro area is part of the Serengeti ecosystem, and to the north-west it adjoins the Serengeti NP and is contiguous with the southern Serengeti plains. These plains also extend to the north into the unprotected Loliondo division and are kept open to wildlife through transhuman pastoralism practiced by Masai. The south and west of the area are volcanic highlands and the southern and eastern boundaries are approximately defined by the rim of the Great Rift Valley wall, which also prevents animal migration in these directions.
