Eastern Hills Expedition - Katavi National Park

Welcome to Africa’s heart—where every journey begins with a warm embrace and endless wonders!

The Park offers wildlife in abundance and it has one of Tanzania's greatest concentrations of buffalo, elephants and hippos. It was established in 1974 and is one of the most remote, vast, natural and pristine parks in Africa. The park also rich in plant and wildlife nature resources. The most convenient way to reach Katavi is via a 4-5 hour-chartered flight from Arusha or Dar es Salaam. Depending on your itinerary, your entry point to Katavi will be through Kilimanjaro International Airport (46 km from Arusha) or the Julius Nyerere International Airport in Dar. Katavi National Park is a classic dry-season park, with the game getting progressively better towards the end of the dry season. July through to October is regarded as the best time of year to travel, with the highest concentrations of game around the plains and the park's only water supplies.

Wildlife features include large animal herds, particularly of Cape Buffaloes, zebras, giraffes, and elephants, plus along the Katuma river, crocodiles and hippos which upon annual dry seasons results in mudholes that can be packed with hundreds of hippos. Carnivorous animals that roam this park are cheetahs, wild dogs, hyenas, leopards, and lions. Some sources claim a very high biodiversity in the park, although there are also reports of wildlife decline due to illegal hunting and poaching, presumably 'bushmeat' sustenance. The area south-east of the Park near Lake Chada had the highest mammal numbers

Access to Katavi via ground transportation: estimates vary widely; it is generally discussed in hours. The town of Mbeya is (550 km/340 miles) distant and is described as a spectacular drive. You can reach Katavi from Mwanza where the road is quite standard and it will take 8-10 hours by road passing through Shinyanga and Tabora regions.

Katavi National Park is a name to conjure with. It is one of the best parks in Africa and many safari camp owners would love to build camps here. However, the logistics are somehow difficult, and only a couple of small, permanent safari camps share the 4,500km² of wilderness. You sometimes run across more prides of lion than other people on a Katavi game drive. As this park in western Tanzania is extremely remote but well accessed, most itineraries staying here are quite costly. On the plus side, being fairly empty of visitors and the country’s third largest national park, it is an unspoiled, unique destination for fantastic game drives and walks. Moreover, game sightings during Tanzania safari holidays to Katavi National Park rarely disappoint; especially during dry season you can expect some truly spectacular wildlife.

During the dry season, the Katuma and Kapapa rivers are the only water for miles. As the game goes down to drink, hundreds of hippo congregate in the tiniest waterhole and enormous crocodiles sit out the heat in river-bank mud-holes.

Katavi National Park is at its best in the dry season, when the plains fill with thousands of zebra, topi and impala. Hartebeest, giraffe, and Defassa waterbuck are also very common. There's a large population of resident elephants, and some impressive herds of buffalo. Katavi is a great park for watching lion-buffalo interactions. Spotted hyena are frequently seen, whilst leopard appear on the woodland fringes, but are more elusive. Wild dog do live here, but tend to stick to the escarpment and are rarely seen on the plains.

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