Officially Tanzania's smallest national park, tiny Rubondo Island in the heart of Africa's largest lake packs a lot into its 240 square km. Known as the Jewel of Victoria, Rubondo Island National Park boasts a unique diversity of flora and fauna, including the endemic Sitatunga.

The Samburu National Reserve lies on the hot and arid vast desert once known as the Northern frontier district. It is a less crowded reserve but offering great encounters. The heat scorched scrublands extending all way to the waters of Lake Turkana and beyond are the home to Samburu people who are cousins to the Maasai.

Frequently compared to the Serengeti in the north, Mikumi is a sprawling national park that borders the massive Selous Game Reserve.
The broad Mkata floodplain is an ideal place to spot lions as they lazily survey the vast herds of buffalo, zebra, wildebeest, and impala that roam the grasslands. Elephants seek the shade of acacia stands while hippopotamuses wallow in pools close to the entrance gate.

One of the most important watersheds for the Great Ruaha River, Kitulo is well known for its floral significance – not only a multitude of orchids, but also the stunning yellow-orange red-hot poker and a variety of aloes, proteas, geraniums, giant lobelias, lilies and aster daisies, of which more than 30 species are endemic to southern Tanzania.

Amboseli is a land of wide dry plains with the vistas stretching to the farthest horizon to become one with the sky. It is dotted with green swamps among semi-arid plains of acacia trees and grasses where great herds of elephants rule the land. The park is renowned for its elephant population - large, tusked bulls, of which the most iconic Tim, a huge elephant with tusks reaching the ground, sadly died of natural causes in 2020, at an estimated age of fifty years.

Gombe Stream National Park is a great place to see chimps up close and personal, as many of the family groups are habituated to humans. With the possible exception of Mahale Mountains National Park, no other park in Africa can offer such a magnificent experience with chimpanzees.