Activities in Lake Manyara National Park

Activities in Lake Manyara National Park ( things to do in lake Manyara national park) are the ventures that the travelers engage in when they visit the park in Tanzania on wildlife safaris. Inside and outside Lake Manyara National Park there are attractions that suit various activities of Lake Manyara National Park that people visit experience. Lake Manyara national park covers 330km squared and has created various tour options either in Lake areas, arid areas or outside areas of the park. More than half of the park is the Lake where different social, economic and cultural activities take place.

At the boundaries of the park, there are local communities whose economic activities depend on the park’s sustainability. For example, local people use the Lake for fishing activities, grazing their cattle, getting water for their domestic animals and students use it for studying.

Activities of Lake Manyara National Park: Activities are categorized into two types depending on the place where activities going to take place, these types are;

Activities inside the park

Day game driving: Visitors always get a chance to view the mysterious lion species characterized by the behavior of climbing trees. Tree climbing lions are found in Lake Manyara National park and other few places in Tanzania that have been attracting more people. In the day game drive, Lake Manyara does not let down visitors because there are many other animal species ranging from smaller mammals like dik-dik, rabbits, and many others. Also larger mammals like elephants, buffalo, zebra, wildebeest, warthogs and so far
Night game driving: Sometimes it is not possible to see all species during day time because some species are nocturnal. So the best time to see them is night, and even some bird species like nightjar are mostly flying from one place to another during night hours. There special safari jeep only for night game driving these cars are characterized by being open beside and on the top of it to ensure comfortable night game driving and viewing, because using normal safari jeep window glasses inhibit viewing activities because on reflex action of dim lights
Bird watching: In Lake Manyara national park there are more than 500 species of birds that flying here and there. The most attractive are pink flamingo that several times migrate from Lake Natron to Lake Manyara and vice versa. Not only at forests found in the park but also visitors enjoy bird watching at the lake where more species feed insects and get water. Some other species include the yellow-billed storks, marabou storks, goose, turkey, weavers, pelicans, and other hundreds of species
Camping: The park has many campsites where visitors will get accommodated and doing camping activities at the same time. Some camps are luxury and others are ordinary. Some areas are plain areas where visitors have to come with their camping facilities to experience how camping activities
Walking safaris: Walking safaris in the park are organized where visitors walk in the forest but his tour is conducted under the care and perfect security from park rangers so that when dangerous and aggressive animals invade the visitors they will be assured of safety. Walking tours in the park encompasses with visiting some oldest trees that have more than 200 years which is a baobab tree near rift valley escarpment or sometimes it is called Mto wa mbu viewpoint where there is a beautiful view of the village.
Hiking: Inside the park visitors hike to the rift valley escarpment which looks like hills surrounding Lake Manyara national park. It is always a big chance for tourists to go to physical exercise for their body fitness and health. This is also one of the activities of Lake Manyara National Park.
Canoeing: This activity is conducted on Lake Manyara whereby visitors will interact with fishermen who most of the day spend in the Lake. Local canoes that are made up of fig trees and mahogany tree species are used during the tour. During the tour visitors enjoy the natural beautifulness of this alkaline soda lake that is found down the rift valley escarpment

Activities in Lake Manyara National Park — Canoeing on Lake Manyara

Visiting natural hot spring: This activity involves visit the natural phenomena of molten materials eruption. The temperature of the hot spring is about 60 Celsius that is enough to boil an egg within 15 minutes.

Activities outside the park

Village walking tours: Outside the park, it is where Mto wa mbu village which is located a few meters from the lake Manyara entrance gate. The village is good for conducting village walking tours whereby visitors meet the community and see what they are doing every day as they learn new things.
Biking tours: There are biking tours from the village to different parts of Mto wa mbu such as Lake Miwaleni, miwaleni waterfalls, Maasai market especially on Thursday, kibaoni viewpoint and the special bike tour to the Maasai boma where Maasai life will be experienced.
Hiking tours: Several areas are special for hiking activities where visitors get a chance to ascend at these somewhat tall hills of rift valley escarpment. Hills like Kirurumo and Balaa are close to Lake Manyara national park
Camping: Numbers of campsites are found outside than inside, so these campsites are either luxury or ordinary and depend on the preference of a guest. Some of the campsites are Twiga, holiday camps, & beyond tented camps and many others found in Mto wa mbu village
Cultural tours: Being a home of more than 120 ethnic groups, Mto wa mbu finds itself the best place for organizing cultural tourism activities. Visitors enjoy the authentic flavor of locally prepared African cuisines using local knowledge of fueling.
Agro-tours: Agro-tourism activities are organized at Mto wa mbu village or at Rhotia. In Mto wa mbu there are about 1800 square kilometer areas that used for agricultural activities where people cultivate rice, maize, and high percent cultivate banana. Also in Karatu (Rhotia), there is wheat cultivation and coffee cultivation all these ensures the perfect agro- tour.

Lake Manyara National Park is the best for doing activities since has got more options for a visitor to choose. The closeness to Mto wa mbu village plays a big role in ensuring all types of activities in Lake Manyara Nyara National Park are organized rather.