Lake Manyara National Park

There are some elephants. There are lots of monkeys. There are birds. The park itself is dying as the lake grows and kills the trees. The other part of the park seems overgrown. You really only see animals that are within 6ft of the road. If you have been on other safari’s, I would recommend skipping it.

The night safari is a waste as well.

Amazing experience with my 8-year-old son

It's the first time my husband and son had been to Africa. I went there before but for business - only for three days. It's not like we saw on TV (tragedies etc.). We went through Dar-es-salaam, Tanzania's business city. We visited the spice island of Zanzibar first before flying to Arusha and then Lake Manyara National Park - where my son had a blast.

Coming from Minnesota - it felt hot even though it's supposed to be one of their cooler months. But it gets hotter even in Minnesota. We loved the weather.

You can't expect to get the first world service in a third world country but I would say - we're really impressed with what we paid for. Plenty of wildlife, beautiful uncontaminated air, exotic food, very good and kind African people.

It's our best trip ever!! Going again in the next two years,

Lake Manyara is an interesting location that is very different from what one expects in East Africa. The lake provides year-round water, which makes Lake Manyara green and lush, and this location is one of the best for monkeys and baboons. We found, however, that the game drive here was a bit lacking compared to the other three locations we visited. The lake is full of flamingos, but there are no roads passing nearby (at least there were not when we did our game drive), so all we saw was a pink haze in the distance. We also saw small numbers of elephants, lions, giraffes... but after being spoiled by the amount of wildlife in the other parks, we were a wee bit disappointed. It is interesting to see this location, due to its dissimilarity from the other parks, but if you want to save money by cutting a day from the safari, this is the one to skip.

Lake Manyara NP was our first foray into the African wildlife scene and we were not disappointed. Lions, hippos, giraffes, flamingos, baboons, elephants, gazelle, impala, monkeys, and birds, birds, birds.

The best piece of advice I can offer for Lake Manyara or any other safari is to make sure you have a good guide/driver beforehand. You might have to pay a little more for a top guide, but it is well worth the cost. If you can afford a private guide/driver, even better. Ours was exceedingly knowledgeable about the environment and the wildlife. He was able to spot and point out animals that we would have never seen our own. A place like Lake Manyara is quite scenic to drive through, but when someone is able to point out and describe things you would not otherwise notice, it makes the experience truly memorable.