National Parks
Nyerere National Park (Selous GR)
Located in south-eastern Tanzania in a remote and rarely visited part of the country, the Nyerere National Park is Africa’s largest protected wildlife reserve, covering more than 5% of Tanzania’s total area. Due to its remoteness, it is mostly accessed only by small aircraft and the reserve has thus remained one of the untouched gems of Tanzania .
The mighty Rufiji River , the largest river in East Africa , is home to the largest crocodile and hippo populations in Africa. It is one of the reserve’s major attractions as it is also swarming with fish, bringing about some of the world’s best birding opportunities. This wonderfully diverse, vast and well-watered habitat has the right ingredients to hold an unusually high number of animals of all shapes and sizes as well as sustain an extraordinary array of different vegetation types. Nyerere has an estimated 2 100 plant species, 350 bird species, 60 000 elephants , 100 000 Cape buffaloes and over a quarter of the worlds’ approximately 4 000 remaining rare wild dogs .
Ruaha National Park
Ruaha National Park in Tanzania is considered the undiscovered gem and is often called “Tanzania’s best kept secret”. Spectacular landscapes, a huge variety of plant and bird life and an abundance of animals make up some of the Ruaha National Park attractions and also makes it the perfect safari destination. Currently only one-third of the park area is used for tourism leaving the greater majority of wilderness untouched and undiscovered. The central spine of the park is the watershed between the Mzombe and the Great Ruaha River , with its dramatic escarpment covered in large stretches of miombo woodland.
The plains beneath the woodlands has vegetation ranging from dry bush country to treeless grasslands, swamps and evergreen forests intersected by the many sand rivers that are such an impressive feature of this area. Ruaha represents a transition zone where eastern and southern species of flora and fauna overlap and in all and some 1 650 plant species can be found. Ruaha is a bird watcher’s paradise with approximately 526 bird species (more than half of those found in the entire country!).
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