Jongomero

A visit to Ruaha National Park is essential for anyone seeking a true wilderness experience. Covering a conservation area of 10,300 square kilometres in the south west of Tanzania, Ruaha sprawls within and along the Great Rift Valley, covering a unique transition zone where the eastern and southern species of both fauna and flora meet against a dramatic topographical backdrop. This is also one of the few Tanzanian parks where sightings of the rarer antelope, such as sable, roan and both lesser and greater kudu, are a probability rather than a possibility.

Located in this magnificent setting is Jongomero Camp, a luxury safari camp set under shady acacia trees on the banks of the Jongomero Sand River. Accommodation at Jongomero comprises eight large and well appointed tents under enormous thatched roofs that also encompass a spacious private verandah. The dining and living areas are both original and very comfortable, offering a great vantage point from which to take in the sights and sounds of the African bush surrounding the camp.

The camp itself is not fenced and animals are free to pass through as they please. Elephants are daily and nightly visitors to the camp, vast herds of buffalo come within close proximity to the camp itself. Lion occasionally pass through and once every so often the tracks of a leopard can be seen winding down the main pathway as they make their way through the camp. The tents are perfectly secure and guests are frequently subjected to the wonderful feeling of huddling in a tent silently, trying to guess the identity of the enormous pachyderm which may wander by in the continuous quest for herbage.

Although without the massive teeming herds common in the North of the country, Ruaha holds an incredible amount and array of animals with an estimated 20,000 elephants in this one park alone. Ruahas' greatest secret lies in its extraordinary diversity of animals, plants and birds. Within the park as a whole there are over 1600 species of tree, twice as many as the great Selous Game Reserve which is also twice the size of Ruaha. There are a recorded 530 different species of birds here, half of all Tanzania's bird species may be glimpsed in this park making it one of the continents premier birding destinations. With the recent doubling of size of this park the bird list can only increase due to the incorporated wetlands and marshes of the South.